A/71/206 used as a justification for restricting other rights, such as the right to physical and mental integrity, access to justice and due process, protection from discrimination and enjoyment of the rights to education, health or adequate food. 114. To be effective, national monitoring mechanisms need to have the following: (a) A legal mandate safeguarding their autonomy and independence: either under the administration or as external institutions, monitoring mechanisms must be established by law and enjoy autonomy and functional, organizational and financial independence, including in the appointment of their members and their financial viability. This is fundamental if the monitoring mechanisms are to pursue their mandate without interference, including on the part of penitentiary authorities overseeing the administration of centres of deprivation of liberty; (b) Extensive powers to safeguard children’s protection and safety: monitoring mechanisms must have clear roles and responsibilities and broad powers defined by law. These include the right to gain access to any place of deprivation of liberty, including through unannounced visits; the right to access any needed information, to request reports before, during and after the inspection and to receive a prompt response; the right to receive complaints directly from children; and the authority to make public the results of their inspections and recommendations, while preventing the public disclosure of information that may place a child at risk. These mechanisms should be provided with sufficient resources to develop their functions with high-quality standards; (c) A clear human rights mandate to prevent and address any act of torture and other form of violence, as well as to protect the rights of children deprived of liberty, including to good-quality education, adequate physical and mental health and access to due process and to legal safeguards to participate in proceedings; (d) Age-, gender- and child-sensitive complaints mechanisms to inform their work: easy and safe access by children deprived of liberty to counselling, complaints and reporting systems and to inspection and monitoring mechanisms is crucial. These mechanisms should take children’s views and experiences into consideration both to identify and pursue incidents of violence through administrative and criminal investigations and to establish the acco untability of perpetrators, and seek children’s opinions on the organizational and structural dimensions of detention centres, the quality of programmes and of staff, and the safeguarding of children’s rights, which otherwise may go unnoticed; (e) Access to sound data and standardized qualitative and quantitative monitoring tools, which are essential to inform a precise and objective monitoring system for places of detention, to guide strategic legal and policy reforms and the strengthening of a child-sensitive juvenile justice system, and to safeguard the rights of children deprived of liberty. Qualitative data may include surveys, interviews with children and staff, and individual assessments and recommendations issued from the inspection. Quantitative data include disaggregated information on the number of children deprived of liberty, including on the basis of gender, age and ethnic and national origin, the institutions where they are placed and the reasons for and duration of the deprivation of their liberty, and the types of crimes for which they are considered responsible and the sanctions imposed, as well as information on daily routines, food and disciplinary registries and rehabilitation and reintegration programmes, and on resource allocation and security measures, such 22/23 16-12906