In addition, the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (the CPT) concluded in its annual report of 2016 that poor detention conditions are largely linked to overcrowding resulting from the overuse of pre-trial detention and a lack of enforceable regional-level safeguards.16 Despite the absence of EU legislation addressing directly pre-trial detention, developments in EU law on procedural rights of suspects have had some impact on pre-trial detention decision-making. Under the programme laid out in the Roadmap, the EU has adopted six directives on criminal procedural rights (together, the Directives): a) Directive 2010/64/EU on the right to interpretation and translation in criminal proceedings (the Interpretation and Translation Directive);17 b) Directive 2012/13/EU on the right to information in criminal proceedings (the Right to Information Directive);18 c) Directive 2013/48/EU on the right of access to a lawyer in criminal proceedings (the Access to a Lawyer Directive);19 d) Directive on the presumption of innocence and the right to be present at one’s trial (the Presumption of Innocence Directive);20 e) Directive on procedural safeguards for children who are suspects or accused persons in criminal proceedings (the Children’s Rights Directive);21 and f) Directive on legal aid for suspects and accused persons in criminal proceedings and for requested persons in European arrest warrant proceedings (the Legal Aid Directive).22 Because each of these Directives focuses at least in part on procedural protections during the pre-trial period, they have 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 10 the potential to improve the administration of pre-trial detention and constrain its excessive use. However, the Presumption of Innocence Directive,23 while noting the ‘clear link’ between the presumption of innocence and the right to pre-trial liberty,24 explicitly excludes pre-trial detention from its scope on the basis that the topic was dealt with by other initiatives.25 The Directive makes reference to the Commission’s Green Paper on Detention and the resulting Parliamentary vote in favour of a legislative tool to address the EU-wide problem of overuse of pre-trial detention. Fair Trials’ work on pre-trial detention Fair Trials has called for pre-trial detention reform in the EU since 2011, with the publication of Detained without Trial26 – our response to the Green Paper. Fair Trials was one of over 50 NGOs that echoed the call for improved protection of minimum standards of procedural rights in relation to pre-trial detention, and six Member States supported legislation in this area.27 In the following year, Fair Trials, with the Legal Experts Advisory Panel (LEAP) network of lawyers, academics and NGOs wrote to all Members of Parliament asking them to call on the Commission to act on their 2011 vote and propose minimum standards on pre-trial detention.28 In 2013, in coalition with over 20 other European NGOs, Fair Trials wrote to then-Commissioner for Justice, Fundamental Rights and Citizenship, Viviane Reding,29 to call for progress on better regional procedural protections and data collection on pretrial detention, and made further appeals in a submission to the Commission’s “Assises de la Justice” later that year.30 Following research across ten EU jurisdictions (England and Wales,31 Greece,32 Hungary,33 Italy,34 Ireland,35 Lithuania,36 Netherlands,37 Poland,38 Romania,39 and Spain40) on the practice of pre-trial detention decision-making and the use of alternatives to detention, in 2016, Fair Trials released the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (CPT), 26th General Report of the CPT, 1 January - 31 December 2016, available at: https://rm.coe.int/168070af7a. https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELEX:32010L0064&from=EN . https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELEX:32012L0013&from=EN . https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELEX:32013L0048&from=EN . https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELEX:32016L0343&from=EN . https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELEX:32016L0800&from=EN . https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELEX:32016L1919&from=EN . Directive (EU) 2016/343 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 9 March 2016 on the strengthening of certain aspects of the presumption of innocence and of the right to be present at the trial in criminal proceedings. Ibid., para. 1.14. Ibid., para. 1.16. Fair Trials, Detained without trial: Fair Trials International’s response to the European Commission’s Green Paper on detention, October 2011, available at: https://www.fairtrials.org/documents/DetentionWithoutTrialFullReport.pdf . For a summary of the responses to the Green Paper, see Fair Trials’ Pre-Trial Detention Update Report, 4 May 2012, available at https://www.fairtrials.org/publications/pre-trialdetention-update-report/ . Letter (15 June 2012), available at: https://www.fairtrials.org/documents/Final_PTD_Letter_to_MEPs.pdf. Letter (10 Sep 2013), available at: https://www.fairtrials.org/wp-content/uploads/Letter-to-Viviane-Redingon-PTD.pdf. Fair Trials, December 2013, Submission to the European Commission, Assises de la Justice Consultation, available at: http://ec.europa.eu/justice/events/assisesjustice2013/files/contributions/76.fair_trials_international_en.pdf. University of the West of England. Centre for European and Constitutional Law. Hungarian Helsinki Committee. Associazione Antigone. Irish Penal Reform Trust. Human Rights Monitoring Institute. University of Leiden. Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights Poland. APADOR-CH Romania. Associación Pro Derechos Humanos España.