ANNUAL SPECIAL REPORT 2016 25 of the ‘50s (i.e. the decade when the Penal Code was formulated) and that it recognises the need for its revision. In this framework, the Ministry of Justice, in collaboration with the Ministry of Health, began a study on harmonising the provisions of the criminal law and the capacities of psychiatric care, establishing a special legislative committee aimed at drafting a bill to modernise the relevant criminal law provisions to meet the requirements of the contemporary reality of criminal and psychiatric science. On a more recent visit to the PHA the NPM was assured that the relevant procedure has been set in motion. Following the on-site inspection of the Lechaina Branch for People with Disabilities of the Social Welfare Centre of the Region of Western Attica, where the living conditions of the inmates were found to be exceptionally bad (see Annual Report 2015, p. 140), the NPM again underlines what the Ombudsman had expressed in the past (2011) with regard to the need for planning and scheduling the gradual closing of the asylum-type welfare units, such as this centre, which accommodates both minors and adults with disabilities and long-term disorders. At the same time, it recommends that they be replaced by foster programmes and small family-type units, which will operate within the community in order to ensure a link with the local community services and members of the community, according to the principles and deinstitutionalisation policy promoted in the EU, based on the principles of non-discrimination and non-exclusion. The Ombudsman has been informed that the procedure to terminate the operation of the specific institution has begun, with the aim of transferring all children and adults to other units. The Institute of Child Health is collabo-