Annual Report 2012: Spain’s National Preventive Mechanism istries, associations and groups that were affected to enable them to give their opinion regarding the draft. There are numerous legal gaps in the forced committal of elderly persons to residential care centers The non-voluntary committal of elderly persons to residential care centers must also be regulated Maximum specialization of judicial bodies should be achieved The creation of a Public Prosecutor’s Office specialized in the protection of persons with disabilities is recommended 132 168. In respect to forced committal to residential care centers for the elderly and the disabled, Law 39/2006, of 14 December, on the Promotion of Personal Autonomy and Care of persons in a situation of dependency includes, in the rights of persons in a situation of dependency, the right «to freely decide regard­ ing entering a living residence, and to the full exercise of their jurisdictional rights in the case of involuntary committal, with the guarantee of contradictory proceedings». Notwithstanding the foregoing, the important legal gaps that ex­ ist in this respect have given rise to the application by public administrations as well as judges and public prosecutors of criteria that is contradictory and has very different implications. Given the disparity of figures regarding proceedings initiated in the different regional autonomous communities shown in Table 172, the difference of criteria that exists in each judicial district in respect to the re­ quirement of having or not judicial authorization for committing persons to certain centers can be inferred. In consequence, the NPM has asked the Office of the Secretary of State that the aforementioned organic draft bill also regulate the non-voluntary committal of elderly persons to residential care centers when they are not in condition to pro­ vide valid consent, establishing necessary legal guarantees for the full respect of the rights of citizens, both fundamental rights and specific rights in the field of health. 169. In order to guarantee the respect and protection of the rights of persons for whom forced committal or a declaration of incapacity is requested, the NPM has informed the General Council of the Spanish Judicial Authority (abbreviated as CGPJ in Spanish) that judicial bodies must acquire maximum specialization and that matters of forced committal and incapacitation in major cities should cor­ respond to a single judge, where this has not yet occurred and where there are several judges. In this respect, the General Council of the Spanish Judicial Au­ thority has pointed out that when specialization is not possible in a judicial dis­ trict due to the workload, incapacity, committal and guardianship proceedings are sent to a sole court, making it easier to adopt uniform criteria and speeding up the resolution of conflicts. Likewise, information has been requested from the Spanish Attorney General’s Office (abbreviated as FGE in Spanish) regarding the current level of specializa­ tion in the Provincial Public Prosecutor’s Office in respect to the protection of persons with disabilities, and regarding the existence in different Public Prosecu­ tor Offices of guidelines for public prosecutors in charge of the protection of per­ sons with disabilities to regularly inspect centers, residential care centers and supervised apartments, pursuant to the faculty-duty assigned to the Public Pros­ ecutor’s Office in Article 4.2 of its Organic Statute. In any case, the creation of a Public Prosecutor’s Office specialized in the protection of persons with disabiliTHE OMBUDSMAN OF SPAIN