Mediation Matters: How do we persuade more couples who attend an assessment meeting to undertake full mediation?

The Chief Executive of National Family Mediation returns with a regular column

Mediators aren’t salespeople, but most would say that at the initial mediation information and assessment meeting (MIAM), when mediation is explained, with knowledge that in just a few meetings settlement is within grasp, the client is usually sold on the benefits. But as things stand the main barrier to more couples experiencing mediation is the engagement of ‘client two’, the sometimes-reluctant ex of the person who’s approached a mediator.

You would have thought that in getting to grips with 2014’s legislative changes, the Government and judiciary would have seen that the lack of incentives for the engagement of client two, usually the respondent, would severely impact on the success of the flagship pro-mediation policy. Yet four years on, with falling numbers and flagging rates of conversion from MIAM to full mediation, the Government appears decidedly indifferent or lukewarm to examining simple ways to improve access to mediation so more people experience its benefits.

Read the full article here.