<P> The Civil Procedure Rules (CPR) are the rules of civil procedure used by the Court of Appeal, High Court of Justice, and County Courts in civil cases in England and Wales . They apply to all cases commenced after 26 April 1999, and largely replace the Rules of the Supreme Court and the County Court Rules . </P> <P> The CPR were designed to improve access to justice by making legal proceedings cheaper, quicker, and easier to understand for non-lawyers . As a consequence of this, many archaic legal terms were replaced with "plain English" equivalents, such as "claimant" for "plaintiff" and "witness summons" for "subpoena". </P>

When did the civil procedure rules and accompanying practice directions come into force