[4] The court has two divisions, Criminal and Civil, led by the Lady Chief Justice and the Master of the Rolls respectively.

[9] A second set of reforms to the appeals system followed the report of the Evershed Committee on High Court Procedure in 1953, which recognised the high cost to the litigants of an additional set of appeals, particularly since the loser in a civil case paid the victor's legal bills.

Among the few changes that were made, the practice ceased of counsel reading out the judgment, cross-examinations, documents and evidence given in the lower court; this saved time and costs.

In 1966 this was merged with its older namesake, establishing the present-day structure of a single Court of Appeal with two Divisions: Civil and Criminal.

Although the British judges found the emphasis on written arguments unattractive, they did like the idea of pre-reading: that the court should read the pleadings of counsel, the case being appealed and the judgment from the lower court before delivering its judgment.

The court over which Lord Denning presided from 1962 to 1982 was under no pressure and had no inclination to modernise, with liaisons and management[clarification needed] handled by clerks with little knowledge.

[clarification needed] This changed in 1981 with the appointment of a Registrar, John Adams, an academic and lawyer, who significantly reformed the internal workings of the Court.

[14] Bowman's recommendations were mainly enacted through statutory provisions, such as Part IV of the Access to Justice Act 1999.

In Tanfern Ltd v Cameron-MacDonald [2000] 1 WLR 1311, Brooke LJ laid down the procedural methods of the Court of Appeal post-Woolf and Bowman.

The Civil Division is bound by the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom when making decisions, and is normally bound by its own previous decisions, with four exceptions:[citation needed] The first three were established by the case of Young v Bristol Aeroplane Co Ltd in 1946, the fourth by R (on the application of Kadhim) v Brent London Borough Housing Benefit Review Board in 2001.

With only three judges on the bench (rather than five or more in the Supreme Court), this allows the Master of the Rolls huge opportunity for shaping the common law and, most notably, Lord Denning made the most of this potential.

[19] The Criminal Division, while bound by the Supreme Court, is more flexible with binding itself, due to the heightened stakes in a case where a possible penalty is a prison sentence.

[22] Appeals are allowed if the decision in the court below was incorrect, or suffered from a serious procedural error or irregularity.

In Re T (A Child) [2002] EWCA Civ 1736, the Civil Division strongly advised that counsel apply at the lower courts, since the judge, fully aware of the facts, will take less time to process, there is no harm if the application fails or if it is approved but counsel decides not to proceed with the case and there are no additional costs involved.

The only problem here is that judgments may occasionally be reserved, and only given later by post – there may not be an opportunity to ask for permission to appeal at the lower court.

Section 52.11(1) of the Civil Procedure Rules 1998 establishes that appeals should always be reviews, unless there are individual circumstances that, "in the interest of justice", make a rehearing necessary.

[29] Qualifying cases seeking settlement of contract or personal injury claims up to a value of £100,000, for which permission to appeal has been sought, obtained or adjourned, may be referred to the Court of Appeal Mediation Scheme, a mediation scheme operated by the Centre for Effective Dispute Resolution (CEDR), so that cases can be resolved more speedily without absorbing court time and impacting less significantly on any ongoing relationship between the litigants.