A prisoner can be released early on compassionate grounds such as great age, injury, disability or ill health; which has also seen several life sentence prisoners being granted early release a considerable length of time before the date when they could first apply for parole. A whole life order can also be quashed on appeal by the Court of Appeal; a number of prisoners have had their sentences reduced by this method. From 1983, the Home Secretary had the right to decide how long a life sentence prisoner should serve before being considered for parole, and the trial judge was not obliged to recommend when or if an offender should be considered for parole. In some cases, the trial judge had recommended that a life sentence prisoner should at some point be considered for parole, only for the Home Secretary to later impose a whole life order.