The Access to Justice Act 1999 (Destination of Appeals) Order 2000

Explanatory Note

(This note is not part of the Order)

The primary purpose of this Order is to provide that from 2nd May 2000 appeals from the county courts other than in family proceedings will, in most cases, lie to the High Court rather than to the Court of Appeal (article 3(1)).

Appeals from decisions of masters, registrars and district judges of the High Court will continue to lie to a judge of the High Court (article 2). Similarly appeals from district judges in county courts will continue to lie to a judge of a county court (article 3(2)). These routes of appeal are currently set out in RSC Order 58 (Schedule 1 to the Civil Procedure Rules 1998) and CCR Order 13, rule 1 and Order 37, rule 6 (Schedule 2 to the Civil Procedure Rules 1998). Because these Orders will be revoked from 2nd May by the Civil Procedure (Amendment) Rules 2000 (S.I. 2000/221), it is necessary to provide for the routes of appeal in this Order.

If the decision to be appealed is a final decision in a claim allocated to the multi-track or made in specialist proceedings or was itself made on appeal, the appeal will lie to the Court of Appeal irrespective of the court of first instance (articles 4 and 5).