A prison board to deal with the concerns and complaints of detainees at immigrant detention centres is still to see the light of day despite assurances given over two-and-a-half years ago.

Such a board, which is meant to operate in much the same way as that for inmates at the Corradino Correctional Facility, had been promised after 100 Maltese journalists petitioned the Justice and Home Affairs Ministry in February 2005 for access to detention centres following reports of appalling living conditions.

The petition had been denied, but an assurance was given that a prison board with the special remit of such detention centres would be set up.

To date, and despite report after report of deplorable living conditions in detention centres, no such board is in operation.

Journalists, meanwhile, have been granted access on one occasion since then – last March, curiously the day before the arrival of a delegation from the European Parliament’s Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs Committee on a fact-finding mission. One of the committee’s concerns was that journalists were continually denied access.

In the meantime, conditions at detention centres remain dire and are having a marked effect on detainees.

A recent report by international humanitarian medical organisation Médecins du Monde (MdM), which provided health services for migrants at Malta’s open centres this summer, described living conditions at both the open and detention centres as “deplorable”.

Such conditions, it found, contribute to and are many times responsible for an array of physical and psychological ailments typical of vulnerable people, detained and living in overcrowded conditions with unsatisfactory sanitation.

Such ailments include a range of dermatological, respiratory and psychological afflictions – many times brought on by living conditions at detention centres.

Conditions at detention centres, according to MdM, “remain detrimental and do not conform to standards set for people deprived of their liberty”. Among the main areas of concern are the existing overcrowded conditions, “appalling” sanitary facilities, a total lack of meaningful activities and a restriction from fresh air and sunshine.

Among the most concerning living conditions was the fact that many detainees, including children, enjoy outdoors access for just two hours a week – as pointed out in the case of Lyster Barracks at Hal Far.

Severe overcrowding, a lack of suitable sanitary facilities and basic furniture such as chairs and tables, as well as the fact that hundreds of people live in cramped tents and common rooms all year round were also of major concern.

The cohabitation of single men, women, sometimes with their babies, was also cited as presenting a serious threat of sexual harassment, and that vulnerable asylum seekers such as pregnant women, children and babies were sometimes detained for up to six weeks and more.

Referring to conditions at the Hal Far ‘tent city’, the medical NGO found poor sanitary maintenance, rats and unsatisfactory housing.

Up to 24 people are housed in a single military tent with temperatures reaching 40 degrees Celsius in summer and descending to eight degrees in winter, while rain regularly penetrates the tents in winter.