Schedule 8: Costs in criminal cases: service courts Schedule 17: Restatement of transitional provision Chapter 5: Dangerous Offenders Section 125 and Schedule 20: New extended sentences: release on licence
672.Section 125 sets out the release arrangements for the new extended sentence (see new sections 226A and 226B, inserted by section 125). Different release arrangements will apply depending on the seriousness of the offence in respect of which the sentence was imposed. Offenders who have committed an offence listed in Parts 1 to 3 of Schedule 15B, or whose offending merits a custodial term of 10 years or more, will be considered for release on licence by the Parole Board once the offender has served two-thirds of the appropriate custodial term, and will be released automatically at the end of the appropriate custodial term if the Parole Board has not already directed release. Offenders who have not committed a Schedule 15B offence but have committed an offence meriting an appropriate custodial term of less than 10 years will be released automatically after two-thirds of the appropriate custodial term.
673.The section also provides for the Parole Board to apply the same release test for the new extended sentence as it currently applies to indeterminate sentences for public protection and life sentences (see section 28 of the Crime (Sentences) Act 1997).
674.Subsection (2) amends section 244 of the 1991 Act to exclude the new extended sentence from the automatic release provisions that apply to other determinate sentences.
675.Subsection (3) of the new section inserts a new section 246A in the 1991 Act (release on licence of prisoners serving extended sentence under section 226A or 226B).