Prison overcrowding in Belgium reaches new heights

Belgium’s prisons are bursting at the seams, with 13,118 inmates housed in Belgian prisons that only have 11,040 places and 320 prisoners sleeping on mattresses on the floor.

This is “an all-time record”, the new prison administration figures have revealed.

Thérèse d’Udekem d’Acoz, Chair of the Huy-Marneffe Prison Supervisory Committee (CSP), in the Liège region, said the situation was particularly worrying, “with a peak of 98 prisoners for a theoretical capacity of 63 places”.

The “critical” overcrowding is forcing some inmates to sleep on the floor, in cells designed for one person and now occupied by four, she added.

On some days, mattresses have to be placed on the floor in dilapidated 9m² cells, “between a bunk bed, a narrow table, two chairs and a toilet separated by low wall, which prevents prisoners from moving, even though they are locked up for 23 hours a day,” she continued.

“These are detention conditions unworthy of a constitutional state, and we have a duty to denounce them, as people responsible for monitoring respect for human rights in prison.”

Belgium has 38 prisons. There are different types of prison throughout the country, including classic prisons and detention centres.

Management of the prisons is entrusted to the justice ministry's directorate general of prisons. The main mission of this department is to carry out sentences in a “correct, safe and humane manner and to help prisoners prepare for their rapid reintegration into society".