OPINIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS OF THE FRENCH CGLPL Prisoners have no access to a telephone, contrary to the requirements of article  39 of the Penitentiary law of 24th  November 2009.57 The institution has no telephone booth and has never arranged for any prisoner to use the department’s telephones. It is impossible to make an appointment to use the visiting rooms. Families arrive having sometimes made very long journeys, for example from the Northern Province - a few hundred kilometres by coach - or even from the Loyalty Islands. They have to wait outside and are admitted to the visiting room on a first come first served basis. Lengthy conversations are not always granted to those who come from afar – there are even cases of some having to leave without having seen the person concerned. The medical centre is situated within the remand prison. This creates problems for transiting prisoners and for women and minors to gain access and, coupled with the shortage of medical staff and the small capacity of the waiting rooms, means that access to healthcare is problematic - to such an extent that there is frequently a greater than 60% of absenteeism among those expected to attend. Drugs, medicines and other medical supplies are given to prisoners in their cells without any guarantee that they are given to the correct person, due largely to the overcrowding and the frequent reallocation which render proper identification uncertain. 5/ The running and the physical state of the prison thus appear to constitute a serious violation of the rights of the prisoners; the staff – remarkably dedicated and committed – are clearly both exhausted and very concerned about the absence of any perspective for the institution. The Contr��le général shares the opinion given concerning the drama that occurred during the present mission58 which stated that it “could not be dissociated from the inevitable consequences brought about by the overcrowding and the prevailing conditions of detention”. 6/ Such circumstances are clearly not unknown to the local French penitentiary law n°2009-1436 of 24th November 2009: http://www. legifrance.gouv.fr/affichTexte.do?cidTexte=JORFTEXT000021312171&categorieLien =id (in French). Applicable throughout New Caledonia, according to article 99. 58 A murder was committed during the night in one of the remand prison’s cells occupied by six people. 57 116