IV. Submission of recommendations and reactions by the authorities Each inspection visit is followed by the National Agency drawing up a report. The latter is addressed to the competent supervisory authority and is also forwarded to the visited facility for its information. In accordance with Article 22 OP-CAT, authorities are obliged to examine the recommendations of the National Agency and to enter into a dialogue on them. Initial suggestions and recommendations of the National Agency were already taken up in situ in some cases. As a matter of principle, however, the supervisory authority in question makes statements on the report and provides information on the implementation of the recommendations by the facility visited. The experience of the National Agency here is that the response to the visit reports takes place at the ministerial level as a rule. This is welcome as it makes clear the considerable significance attached to the topic there. However, this statement was not made in a timely manner in all cases. The request for documents even had to be repeated in some cases. The Commission was unable to draft the visit report until the documents had been provided. In future, therefore, the National Agency will have already requested a statement as to when it may expect a statement when it sends the report. It considers a processing period of four weeks after receipt of the report to be appropriate here as a rule. The content of the responses of the supervisory authorities was unsatisfactory in several cases. Some did not explore the shortcomings that had been ascertained. The National Agency has not been able to follow up in all cases so far because of its restricted staffing capacity. The supervisory authorities were however frequently very open to the recommendations. This makes it clear that the activity of the National Agency is taken seriously and that the system of regular inspection visits can indeed lead to an improvement in the conditions for individuals in custody. In addition to submitting recommendations, it is also the job of the National Agency to examine their implementation, for instance through a follow-up visit. However, as has already been noted, this is currently only possible to a very limited degree because of the current staffing situation. The National Agency however presumes that where a Ministry has announced that it will examine a circumstance, the outcome of this examination will be provided without being requested. V. The spotlight of the visits by the National Agency and examples of best practice As a matter of principle, the attention of the National Agency in an inspection is focussed on the general accommodation conditions, and particularly on measures which can lead to a tightening up of detention conditions. Furthermore, security concepts, as well as therapeutic, suicide and violence prophylactic concepts, are informative. Moreover, specific foci emerge from the respective area of responsibility of the facilities which must be taken into account in an inspection visit. In the long term, the activity of the National Agency is also to promote an exchange of particularly successful practical examples between the Länder. The examples below can only provide an initial insight into the concrete implementation practice. The National Agency is very much interested in further positive examples. Prisons The following inspection spotlights relate mainly to prisons since the Commission of the Län- 18