fundamental and human rights �.� national preventive mechanism against torture The information obtained and experience gained during visits can be utilised in the handling of complaints, and vice versa. For this reason, too, it is important that those members of the Office’s personnel whose area of responsibility covers facilities within the scope of the OPCAT also participate in the tasks of the NPM. In practice, this means the majority of the Office’s legal advisers, nearly 30 people. The OPCAT requires the States Parties to make available the necessary resources for the functioning of the NPM. The Government proposal concerning the adoption of the OPCAT (HE 182/2012 vp) notes that in the interest of effective performance of obligations under the OPCAT, the personnel resources at the Office of the Parliamentary Ombudsman should be increased. In its recommendations issued on the basis of Finland’s seventh periodic report, the UN Committee against Torture (CAT) expressed its concern about the Ombudsman having insufficient financial or human resources to fulfil the mandate of the NPM. The CAT recommended that the State strengthen the NPM by providing it with sufficient resources to fulfil its mandate independently and efficiently. The CAT also recommended that Finland should consider the possibility of establishing the NPM as a separate entity under the Parliamentary Ombudsman. The Ombudsman submitted his statement on the matter to the Ministry for Foreign Affairs on 13 October 2017. The Ombudsman states that the Office has so far received no additional human resources to fulfil its remit as the NPM, although such increases have been proposed. The Office of the Parliamentary Ombudsman’s operating and financial plan for 2019–2022 states that allowances should be made for increasing the human resources in the NPM’s area of responsibility in the planning period. In the Office’s estimate, two additional posts would be required in addition to the current legal adviser coordinating the duties of the NPM, obtained through internal organisational changes. The required additional officials would be a coordinator and assistant. In the budget proposal for 2018, the Ombudsman did not propose an appropriation for the new posts. This is partly due to the fact that the results of the report on the division of duties between the Parliamentary Ombudsman and Chancellor of Justice have not been yet decided. 3.5.2 OPERATING MODEL The tasks of the National Preventive Mechanism have been organised without setting up a separate NPM unit in the Office of the Parliamentary Ombudsman. To improve coordination within the NPM, the Ombudsman decided to assign one legal adviser exclusively to the role of coordinator. This was achieved through the reorganisation of duties, as no new personnel resources were gained. At the beginning of 2018, the role of principal legal adviser and full-time coordinator for the NPM was assumed by Senior Legal Adviser Iisa Suhonen. She is supported by Principal Legal Adviser Jari Pirjola and on-duty lawyer Pia Wirta, who coordinate the NPM’s activities alongside their other duties, as of 1 January 2018 until further notice. The Ombudsman has also appointed an OPCAT team within the Office. Its members are the principal legal advisers working in areas of responsibility that involve visits to places referred to in the OPCAT. The team has ten members and it is led by the head coordinator of the NPM. The NPM has provides induction training for external experts regarding the related visits. The NPM currently has nine external health care specialists available from the fields of psychiatry, youth psychiatry, geriatric psychiatry, forensic psychiatry, geriatrics and intellectual disability medicine. Four other external experts represent the Disability Section of the Human Rights Centre, and their expertise will be used on visits to units where the rights of disabled people are being restricted. The NPM also employs five experts by experience. Three of them have experience of closed social welfare institutions for children and adolescents, while the expertise of the other two is used in health care visits. During its visits the NPM trives to engage more frequently in constructive dialogue with staff regarding good practices and procedures. Feedback on observations as well as guidance and 73