During the CGLPL’s inspection, a cloud of uncertainty hung over the centre’s future, which was
undermining both the staff’s working conditions and the migrant’s detention conditions. This
uncertainty has since lifted: renovations have been carried out in the centre and new staff have been
recruited.
The centre’s temporary closure during the works provided an opportunity to put some of the
CGLPL’s recommendations into practice: staff training, completely rewriting and translating the rules
of procedure and making the necessary developments whilst keeping visits confidential.
The CGLPL had also recommended taking systematic action following incidents and keeping
CCTV images. According to the Minister of the Interior, the first of these recommendations has been
acted upon, while the second seems to be based upon an incorrect finding.
Finally, the CGLPL had recommended two measures aimed at guaranteeing rights of defence.
First of all this entailed notifying imprisoned people of obligations to leave French territory
(OQTFs) within a timeframe that enabled them to properly exercise their rights of appeal. Because
this notification is made in prison, with no interpreters or a legal aid association present, by the time
the detained migrant gets to the detention centre for illegal immigrants and is finally in a position to
be able to appeal, the time-limit for doing so has passed. With no response forthcoming on this point
from the Minister of the Interior, this recommendation is upheld.
Orders to leave French territory issued to prisoners must be notified under conditions that
enable them to properly exercise their rights of appeal, i.e. when they can immediately benefit
from the services of an interpreter and a legal aid association.
Second, it bore on displaying the list of lawyers and creating a cubicle where confidential
interviews could be held between detained migrants and their lawyer at the Versailles court of first
instance in civil and criminal matters (TGI). It is a shame that the Minister of the Interior has not
specified what action has been taken following these proposals, which are therefore upheld. Even if
one of these measures comes under the purview of the Minister of Justice, the Minister of the Interior
needs to instigate it as he has overall responsibility for the Government’s immigration policy, which
includes detained persons’ rights of defence.
The list of lawyers of the territorially competent bar must systematically be displayed in the living
spaces of detention centres for illegal immigrants. In courts of first instance in civil and criminal
matters, before the hearing with the liberty and custody judge, spaces must be provided to enable
a confidential interview between the detained migrant and his/her lawyer.
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