34 the prison and probation service The Prison and Probation Service At the end of 2019, there were 32 remand prisons in Sweden and 45 prisons with approximately 6,900 places in total. The Prison and Probation Service’s institutions primarily hold people who are deprived of their liberty because they are on remand or serving a prison sentence. Other categories of individuals deprived of their liberty are also placed in the Prison and Probation Service’s remand prisons. These are primarily people who are transported by the Prison and Probation Service’s National Transportation Unit. These may be, for example, young individuals taken into care in accordance with the special provisions in the Care of Young Persons Act (1990:52) or the Care of Substance Abusers Act (1988:870). Likewise, foreigners who are held detained in accordance with the Aliens Act (2005:716) can, under certain conditions, be held in remand prisons. In 2019, the OPCAT Unit carried out 13 inspections of remand prisons and prisons.1 During an inspection of a remand prison, a transportation group of the National Transportation Unit’s was also inspected. This group within the National Transportation Unit had not been previously inspected by the Parliamentary Ombudsmen. Twelve of the inspections were unannounced. Furthermore, two dialogue meetings were held with the Prison and Probation Service regarding both the isolation of inmates held on remand and the prioritisation of transportations. All inspections were carried out, and dialogue meetings held, by or on behalf of Chief Parliamentary Ombudsman Elisabeth Rynning. She additionally made statements following all the inspections and decided on the cases where a response from the Prison and Probation Service had been requested.2 A further four prisons and one remand prison were inspected by the supervisory division. 4.1 Observations made during this year’s inspections The inspections of the remand prisons and prisons cover a number of different issues. In addition to the inspections providing an opportunity to draw attention to shortcomings in the physical environment, they usually also concern questions regarding staff ’s treatment of inmates and how inmates’ 1 The prisons in Haparanda, Kumla (national reception centre), Västervik Norra and Umeå as well as the remand prisons in Falun, Göteborg, Helsingborg (Berga), Kalmar, Karlskrona, Malmö, Nyköping, Trelleborg and Växjö. 2 See the Parliamentary Ombudsmen’s case ref. no. O 7-2018 and ref. no. 8337-2018.