Christine Bicknell presents conference paper on prison oversight in Europe

Christine outlined the different bodies at the international, regional and domestic levels, which all have a mandate directly to undertake prison visits with a view to improving the conditions and treatment of prisoners, and thereby preventing torture. She considered the mandate and working approach of the Sub-committee for the Prevention of Torture (SPT) and the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture (CPT), and outlined some of the models used by states for bodies either designated or established as National Preventive Mechanisms (NPMs) to satisfy a requirement of the Optional Protocol to the Convention against Torture. Her main focus was on the specific relationships between bodies operating within this complex framework and on signalling some of the related challenges and opportunities.

Her talk was adapted from a co-authored book chapter which appears in Tom Daems and Luc Robert (eds), Europe in Prisons: Assessing the Impact of European Institutions on National Prison Systems (Palgrave, 2017).