Report of the HRD on the activities of the National Preventive Mechanism in Poland in 2011 can create a nervous atmosphere which is distinctly felt in the Prison. The prisoners also complained about the inconvenience caused by the ban on smoking in cells at night-time. In the opinion of the Director General of the Prison Service presented in a letter to the Human Rights Defender of 20 September 2006, inmates who smoke should be placed in specially designated cells in semi-open prisons as it is the case in closed prisons, in order to allow them to smoke at times when cells where they live are locked. Therefore, the ban on smoking in cells at night-time, in both semi-open and open prisons, is in contradiction to the presented opinion. In the opinion of the Mechanism, the relations between the Prison Service officers and inmates in Tarnów-Mościce Prison were tense and nervous. It is necessary to quote here the position of the CPT which in paragraph 45 of the 2nd General Report40 states that excessive penalties and degrading treatment of prisoners by the prison staff does not allow for constructive relations and by the same token increases the likelihood of violent incidents and associated ill-treatment. The Committee also states that it wishes to see a spirit of communication and care accompany measures of control and containment. Such an approach, far from undermining security in the establishment, might well enhance it. The visiting team also had reservations about the way in which the detainees of the therapeutic ward of the Prison in Sieradz polished the floor in the corridor of the ward. They were dragging a stone-loaded table upside down with a blanket underneath which served as a polisher. In the opinion of the NPM, the method of cleaning the therapeutic ward constitutes a degrading treatment of the cleaners. The practice was abandoned following the visit of the Mechanism. The heads of the visited establishments reported to the Mechanism that they had reminded their subordinates about the principles of professional ethics of the Prison Service officers and employees, paying attention to appropriate treatment and the way of addressing detainees. The head of Tarnów – Mościce Prison explained that an ad hoc control had been performed by the District Prison Service Inspectorate in Kraków to investigate the alleged irregularities in the treatment of detainees, and the allegations of the NPM had not been confirmed. The treatment of detainees in the establishment is monitored by the Mechanism. The National Preventive Mechanism recommended to: • Take actions aimed at elimination of provocative and degrading treatment of detainees by the staff; • Reduce the number of assemblies to two and change the time of the morning assembly to ensure undisturbed sleep of detainees at night-time; • Change the method of cleaning the therapeutic ward; • Lift the ban on smoking in cells at night-time.  CPT/Inf (92)3. 40 32