The act recognizes that, in certain cases, a custodial sentence may be necessary to protect the public from serious harm, but does not allow an offense to be regarded as more serious simply because the offender has a previous record. The act defines procedures and criteria for imposing custodial sentences that apply in all cases, whether the offense is tried summarily or on indictment and whether the offender is an adult or young offender. It contains guidance on determining whether to give a custodial sentence and on setting custodial sentence length. The act also deals with suspended and extended imprisonment sentences, mitigation and mentally disordered offenders, committal for sentence, and alteration of maximum penalties. Additional provisions concern automatic conditional and unconditional release, discretionary conditional release, life sentence prisoners, breach of license, remission, compassionate release, deportees, young offenders, fine default and contempt of court, remand time, and transitional arrangements.