OPINIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS OF THE FRENCH CGLPL the gates’ dimensions, one interlock entrance is now unusable and one of the doors of the the other has been damaged (significantly endangering the life of a warder). 7/ The state of the buildings is simply accepted with resignation by a large number of staff, who continue to carry out certain duties which are sometimes devoid of any sense, such as the night-time checking of cells with no lighting and no protection covering the doors’ peepholes, or the ‘visual search’, or, conversely, do not carry out instructions which, given the state of things, would not have any effect. 8/ The Baumettes prison buildings do not just suffer from design and construction deficiencies. There is also a maintenance problem. As has already been noted, “the State knows how to build, but it does not know how to maintain”,84 especially concerning prisons. Yes, the prisoners cause plenty of damage – and yes, one can complain but one should not be surprised – and the older the institutions, the greater the effect of such vandalism. But above all, neither the maintenance headcount nor the budget is equal to the task. In just two years, the operational maintenance budget has been reduced by close to a quarter. At the time of the inspectors’ visit, the maintenance team consisted of two genuine technicians, five assistant technicians and six contract employees. There is a back-up of two warders per wing, but these can easily be called to other duties. Each member of the team does what he can, demoralised, handling the most urgent cases as they arrive, without any organised follow-up of the works: their dedication can in no way disguise what should be done and has not been done. 9/ Overcrowding remains the rule: as at 1st  October 2012, in an institution designed for 1'190 places, there were 1'769 prisoners actually present. This number continues to increase, specifically concentrated in the men’s wing, where the occupation rate is 145.80%. Indeed, Marseille takes in prisoners to relieve the ‘overcrowding’ in other remand prisons in the region. Overcrowding in institutions with a delegated management system – a public/private management system - triggers the penalty clauses which the State would then be required to pay. Yet, at the same time there are staffing constraints: not only are staff numbers not at the required level (in particular for The 2010 Annual Report from the Contrôleur général des lieux de privation de liberté, Paris April 2011, p.30. 84 144