COMPULSORY ADMISSION TO HOSPITAL (OPINION) kept locked. Their patients cannot leave freely, even if they wish to take a walk in the park, visit a cafe or take part in a religious service. These restrictions have consequences in terms of patients’ lives (e.g. the range of therapeutic activities on offer or the difficulties encountered in smoking a cigarette) and on their relationships with those close to them. However, the Contrôleur général des lieux de privation de liberté would like to draw attention here to just this one point: the effect of placing such units under lock and key, and thus locking up the people inside them, is to incarcerate patients who have been admitted under the compulsory regime under identical conditions to “freely hospitalised” patients, i.e. those who have consented to come to hospital. We may therefore wonder what has happened to this freedom if, in fact, no more than other people, freely hospitalised patients are not allowed to leave as they wish, and in other words, in reality, are denied their freedom to come and go. In particular, it should be noted that this confinement is not accompanied by any special procedures: it is solely the consequence of the choice made by those in charge of the unit where these patients are staying (they are known to be assigned by geographical “sector”), who have applied for and obtained permission to detain them. Such a situation has not been determined by an individual decision, nor by the notification of any grounds for appeal, nor in particular by the intervention of any court. Questions need to be asked about this way of operating. It might be desirable for a “free patient” to at least be able to choose between an open unit and a secure unit, and if they choose the latter, to ensure that they are advised of their rights, and in particular their right to contest the measure applied to them, without undue delay. 6/ Thirdly, in a growing number of départements of France, fears of a threat to law and order are making it harder to obtain trial discharges and rendering the lifting of compulsory measures prescribing admission to hospital a more uncertain process. Traditionally, representatives of the State broadly kept to the recommendations of the medical opinions submitted to them, and as a result, agreed to the measures requested. However, this is no longer the case today, in three areas. a) The first concerns trial discharges. The authorities responsible for granting permission to discharge a detainee implicitly but necessarily consider that when a trial 79