action on the part of the prison administration or through the person of senior law-enforcement officers. The Contrôleur général will ensure that the application of these principles by the directors of institutions is verified. 1.4 The Fight against Poverty in Prison Request for the establishment of a draft circular concerning the fight against poverty in detention. On 26th April 2012, the Contrôleur général referred the matter of the financial situation of prisoners hospitalised in a unit for difficult psychiatric patients (UMD) to the respective directors of two prisons. Following this action on the part of the Contrôleur général, meetings were organised between the team of the UMD and the management team of one of the institutions concerned. These meetings made the creation of a local partnership possible, in order to help hospitalised persons lacking adequate resources, by putting a “kit” in place containing hygiene products and the allocation of allowances after examination by the single multidisciplinary committee (CPU). The Contrôleur général informed the director of the prisons administration department of the positive actions taken in response to the matters taken up and hoped that this local initiative could be brought into general use in all units for difficult psychiatric patients. In reply to the Contrôleur général’s letter, on 20th June 2012, the director of the prisons administration department indicated that a draft circular concerning the fight against poverty in detention was in the course of validation in order to specify the aid in kind and in cash that it should be possible to allocate to persons committed to prison and hospitalised. At the time of drafting this report in December 2012, the announced circular has still not been published. The Contrôleur général hopes that it will be published in 2013 in order to allow the concrete application of article 31 of the prisons act of 24th November 2009, which provides that persons without adequate resources should be able to have the benefit of aid in kind and in cash. 1.5 Degrading Treatments of Detained Persons Request for solutions to put a stop to inhuman and degrading treatment suffered by persons detained in a detention centre for illegal immigrants. A matter of this nature was referred to the Contrôleur général in 2012 on the testimony of a member of nursing staff working in a detention centre, who wanted to react to a specific situation. Removal of a foreign national from the country not having been possible at the airport, the person concerned had urinated and defecated in their clothes in the course of transport. Consequently, on their arrival at the detention centre for illegal immigrants, his state not permitting the completion of the arrival formalities and security search, the director of the centre took the decision to use an external water tap and a (jet) hose to wash the person. The director explained this decision by pointing out that since the showers were located in the living area, it was thus a question of “avoiding any sanitary risk and avoiding the person being seen in this humiliating situation by the other detainees”. Two days later, a second foreign national, for his part presenting behavioural disorders, stated that he had undergone the same hose down treatment, while being kept handcuffed. 82