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Celso Manata, Director General of Reinsertion and Prison Services, revealed on Monday that the prison population in Portugal "has decreased steadily", which is also due to the incentive of electronic surveillance, which is "exponentially increasing."
"The number of prisoners in prisons has been steadily decreasing, every two weeks we have fewer … prisoners," said Celso Manata, who heads the General Directorate of Reintegration and Prison Services (DGRSP) since 2016.
According to the official, since 2016, the prison population has tended to decrease. "We started with 14,400 prisoners and we are currently with 13,000 prisoners. Things are going the way we want and that has a lot to do with the amendment that was brought last year to the penal code, with the encouragement of electronic surveillance, which is growing exponentially " He said, "We had a serious problem in the prisons and now we have a complicated problem in the electronic surveillance which, on my arrival, did not reach the thousand and now it is there are more than 1500. "
of 2017 and, according to the official, in less than a year, there was" a growth of more than 500 bracelets ", which he considered" very good for the problem of the prison population "
There is no overcrowding at the national level, although there are pockets of overcrowding, but this poses problems in terms of electronic surveillance , we still have some difficulties in terms of personnel and in terms of cars, that no we try to solve. "
Celso Manata also spoke of" chronic deficits "in budgets for the DGRSP, a situation that has lasted for decades." For several years, we started the year with a budget lower than the one we have spent last year and this is a problem we have to face.If we have less money when we start working than the one we spend, things can not work very well " , he said.
The official said that the "problem remains", but stressed that "By" the strength of the reduction of the prison population "and" with support that comes back and a half "has "also from the government". "It was good that one day these things were all regulated."
The budget for 2018 for the Branch was 248 million euros, lower than the 2017, which was 259 million euros.
Celso Manata met with journalists on the sidelines of a stockpile of goods, clothing and footwear, donated by the Food and Economic Security Authority (ASAE) to 76 prison inmates of Vila Real
