Why Family Mediation instead of the Courts?
“People in conflict think if they don’t fight they will lose out – but the system of litigation often costs more than it is worth and makes it harder for people to park their arguments about rights, wrongs and legalities and do a deal. Litigation exacerbates conflict, and mediation calms and resolves it.”
Mary Banham-Hall - lawyer & family mediator http://www.focus-mediation.co.uk
Research shows that family mediation can cost a quarter of the price and take a quarter of the time of going to court and, more importantly, it can ensure better results for families too.
Unlike going to court or arbitration, family mediation recognises that you are the experts about your own family and leaves the decision-making to you. Unlike asking a judge to make the key decisions which will shape the family’s future, family mediation assists and allows you to speak directly to each other, so that you can both explain what you are feeling and what is most important to you.
Summary of general benefits of family mediation over the courts:
- Litigation exacerbates conflict, and mediation calms and resolves it
- Going to court is expensive, emotionally draining and impacts adversely on everyone in the family
- In mediation you are assisted to work in a positive and constructive manner, improving the chances of long term cooperation
- In mediation, communication between disputants is facilitated and more effective; it’s focused on looking to the future and not the past; body-language and tone-of-voice ‘messages’, often carriers of the ‘mixed message’, can be either confirmed or clarified, leading to clear understandings, the heart of good communications
- In mediation stress is reduced; for you, your former partner and indirectly for your children and family
- In mediation there is a concentration on resolving shared problems rather than allocating blame or examining the causes of the problems your family faces
- Mediated sessions are face to face so you hear the other person’s words and are able to speak directly, rather than through letters; body-language and tone-of-voice messages can be clarified rather than be left open to misinterpretation
- You are in control: of the pace and the content of mediation, rather than your future being decided by legislation or the court
- A mediation process tends to be quicker than dealing with disputes through the court process
- A mediation process allows former partners to create a completely flexible and bespoke set of proposals, tailored to fit your family’s particular situation
- Through mediation an outcome can be found that both of you believe is fair to you both, rather than applying an independent measure of fairness as the courts would do
- Even if, for one reason or another, mediation does not in your particular case result in agreed proposals, there will almost always be benefits from having attended mediation, including a better understanding of the other person’s position and interests and an identification of the real issues in the case
- Where financial mediation is not successful, you can return to your solicitor with either partial or complete financial disclosure. This should save your own solicitor a good deal of work which means savings in time and your costs
Notes: The National Audit Office reported that family disputes resolved through mediation are cheaper, quicker and according to academic research, less acrimonious than those settled through the courts.
According to the Ministry of Justice, in 2013 “nearly two thirds of couples who attended a single mediation session for a child dispute reached a full agreement. Almost seven out of every ten couples who opted for mediation reached an agreement.” (Ministry of Justice Press Release published 20 August 2014)
