In a recent open letter to the State Parliamentary Labor Party the Society called on the Party to adopt as its policy the full implementation of the National Preventative Mechanism requirements in the Optional Protocol to the Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (OPCAT).
The open letter follows the NSW Government refusing to allow the Subcommittee on Prevention, formed under OPCAT, to inspect New South Wales custodial facilities. The decision is a plain breach of OPCAT. In the Society's view, the breach may well have been avoided if New South Wales had introduced a National Preventative Mechanism; a local authority assigned to oversee the implementation of OPCAT's principles and to regularly communicate with the UN's Subcommittee on Prevention.