These choices of crime and prison policy, which should be approved, do not resolve all of the issues. Such issues certainly remain with regard to crime policy, since certain principles remain part and parcel of the law and crime policy is currently torn between various different inspirations, while multiple reforms have not contributed to simplifying the interpretation of the law, even for legal professionals. Such issues also remain as far as prisons are concerned. Although it is established that the rate of construction of new prisons is to be slowed down, what is the situation with regard to the need for renovation of old prisons, or at least the most unfit for habitation, the dampest and the most poorly heated amongst them? The manner in which prisoners as well as staff live in prison also requires thought. Twenty-five years of experience clearly shows that changes in material surroundings are far from being enough to improve the atmosphere that prevails in institutions. Public opinion also has to be convinced of these changes, while resisting the desire for expeditious solutions provoked by various odious crimes, and without lessening the debt owed to victims, while also overcoming the idea that prison reform necessitates large resources that we do not have. 2.4.1.2 Disarray among certain Staff It should not pertain to the Contrôleur général to comment on a phenomenon that is purely internal to the prison administration department, and into whose management it cannot and has no desire to enter. However, the interviews conducted by the inspectors both within and outside of institutions have convinced them that the difficulties experienced by certain categories of staff are currently reaching levels such that they cannot fail to have an impact upon the way in which their duties are performed. Let us simply take a measurable fact: absenteeism among operational staff. In certain institutions, such absenteeism is currently reaching high levels. In one prison inspected, the number of days of absence due to sickness or industrial accidents was thus more than 3,500 days for a single half-year, which in relation to the institution’s two hundred and sixty-two officers, and for the year, makes a total of twenty-seven days per year per officer. If absences attributable to industrial accidents, in a profession in which there are many assaults 101, are subtracted from the total days of absence, an average of twenty days per year and per officer still remains. These absences are directly related to working conditions and, in particular, to architectural choices in buildings, which are unpleasant for staff 102 and the volume of the prison population. In one remand prison which was transferred from an old building to brand new buildings constructed under the “thirteen thousand two hundred” programme 103, the number of days of absence increased from two per officer per year in the old institution to 22.8 in the new. The way in which these absences occur may give still greater cause for concern than the absences themselves. On the one hand, it is not only permanent staff who are concerned, but also young trainees who, until recent years, due to the fact that they are not yet confirmed in their posts, never went absent at any cost. On the other hand, absences are noted without the officers concerned even bothering to inform their administration in one way or another. Finally, certain 101 Assaults should certainly not be underestimated but industrial accidents may be due to other causes (accidents in the course of travel for example). 102 Cf. Annual Report for 2010 of the Chief Inspector of places of deprivation of liberty, section 1, notably pp. 31-32. 103 Construction programme initiated by the Act laying down the basic principles for government action (loi th d’orientation et de programmation) with regard to justice no. 2002-1138 of 9 September 2002. 49