Schedules Schedule 12: Prisoner release
Paragraph 1(1) makes amendments to the Northern Ireland (Sentences) Act 1998 ("the Sentences Act"). Under paragraph 1(2), these amendments do not apply in relation to any application for a declaration under section 3(1) of the Sentences Act (declaration that prisoner is eligible for early release) which is made before force on 1 May 2024 (the date on which the Schedule comes into force - see section 63(2)(b)).
	Paragraph 2 makes amendments relating to the meaning of "qualifying offence" for the purposes of provisions relating to eligibility for early release under the Act. The first effect of these amendments is that an offence is not a qualifying offence, and the prisoner is not therefore eligible for early release, if the prisoner was convicted of the offence following a prosecution which began after the date on which section 19(1) of this Act (duty to grant immunity from prosecution where certain conditions are met) came into force.
	The existing early release scheme in the Sentences Act applies to persons convicted of "scheduled offences" between 8 August 1973 and 10 April 1998. "Scheduled offences" are those specified in the Northern Ireland (Emergency Powers) Act 1973 ("the 1973 Act") and subsequent Northern Ireland Emergency Powers Acts. Paragraph 2 also extends the early release scheme by amending the meaning of "qualifying offence" to include an offence committed on or after 1 January 1966 and before 8 August 1973, where the offence (a) arose out of conduct forming part of the Troubles, and (b) is certified as an offence which would have been a scheduled offence within the meaning of the Northern Ireland (Emergency Provisions) Act 1973, had it been committed in Northern Ireland on 8 August 1973.
	Paragraph 3 makes provision equivalent to paragraph 2, in relation to provisions of the Sentences Act which deal with sentences passed outside Northern Ireland (prisoners sentenced in other UK jurisdictions are, if transferred to prisons in Northern Ireland, eligible in principle for release under the early release scheme).