On prisons, the majority sweeps away the controversy and finds an agreement. And the left goes crazy –

After days of tension, the majority finds a “political agreement” and unblocks the prison decree: Forza Italia takes a half step back on its amendments to allow for the rapid approval of the measure, which expires at the beginning of September and must pass to the Chamber. “They were a bit narrow,” summarizes the president of the Justice Commission Giulia Bongiorno, at the end of an early morning meeting with the Minister of Justice Carlo Nordio, the vice-minister Francesco Paolo Sisto and the undersecretaries Andrea Delmastro and Andrea Ostellari. “A political synthesis satisfactory for everyone has been found,” claims Sisto. In the early afternoon the commission finished voting on the measure, without the opposition, which saw all its proposals rejected and has been on the barricades since yesterday. And the text will arrive in the Chamber next week, probably with a vote of confidence.

Overcrowding has once again exceeded 130%, since the beginning of the year 58 people have taken their own lives. “Anguishing conditions in the eyes of anyone with sensitivity and conscience – also denounced the President of the Republic Sergio Mattarella today at the Ventaglio ceremony -. Indecent for a civilized country, which is – and must be – Italy”. And for the center-left, the government’s provision, modified during the process in the commission, does not provide answers. “There are no conditions to contribute to the conversion of this decree”, summarizes the Democratic senator Anna Rossomando, after 24 hours of high tension, with the minority groups, including Italia Viva, on the Aventine. “There is a dry one to all the amendments of the opposition, no opening despite the hearings, the initial declarations and despite the dramatic situation”, she underlines. “As long as the decree is like this and does not impact the situation, we do not want to share the moral responsibility of doing nothing in the face of a tragedy,” echoes Ivan Scalfarotto, of Iv.

Forza Italia gets the yes vote for the rule that allows drug addict prisoners with sentences of up to six years to serve their sentence under house arrest in a therapeutic community, adopted by the government, and the possibility for over 70s to serve the remainder of their sentence under house arrest, in addition to the expansion of probation opportunities. However, the other amendments that aimed to reduce prison presence, expanding the tools for the judiciary, on semi-liberty and the granting of house arrest for sentences of up to 4 years, were withdrawn. The Forza Italia senator Pierantonio Zanettin and the group leader Maurizio Gasparri said they were satisfied with the agreement. “We fully share the opinion expressed by the President of the Republic Sergio Mattarella. We have committed ourselves to trying to solve the prison problem by combining two aspects, that of the humanization of punishment with that of the certainty of punishment”, claims Zanettin, “our objective is to intervene on overcrowding and we count on the government’s interventions to help in this sense”.