NUMBER OF PRISONERS (OPINION) However, the past (unenforced sentences passed before 2012) needs to be wiped out by means of a special amnesty, which would apply – this point needs to be emphasised – solely with regard to offenders having received light sentences; and if a measure of this kind were to appear impossible, judges responsible for the execution of sentences should give favourable consideration, within the framework of article  723-15 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, to the manner in which sentences should be enforced with regard to this population, giving preference to alternatives to imprisonment: however, in order to have an impact, this measure requires the holding of conferences aimed at establishing real reduced sentencing policies within the framework of each court of appeal, which of course need to respect the independence of judges. More generally speaking, the authorities will be confirmed in this measure insofar as, on the one hand, no amnesty was voted at the time of the Presidential elections of 2007 and 2012 and, on the other hand, that no decree of pardon is henceforth made at the time of the Fête Nationale (national holiday). Although the latter point ought to have unanimous support, and it would be desirable for amnesties to no longer have the character of measures taken by force of circumstance, it should nevertheless be acknowledged that amnesties constitute neither a legal incongruity, nor a strange practice within a democratic context and that the disappearance thereof from the national legislative arena should be cause for surprise. It would probably be harmful for Parliament not to be able to vote measures of this kind - though the reasons for such a situation be evident the appropriateness and shape of which it is incumbent upon it to determine: the justification for a measure of this kind at the present time is scarcely questionable. 129