Family Mediation Week 2026: What is mediation

Family law has evolved significantly in recent years.

The traditional “I’ll see you in court” approach has increasingly given way to a more constructive focus on “what can we agree?”.

Family Mediation is a significant part of this progression from a fully adversarial approach when dealing with the most intimate relationships we may have towards a gentler process aimed at achieving the best results for the whole family and prioritising any children.

So, with it being Family Mediation Week this week, what actually IS mediation?

What mediation is

• It is confidential: no one can tell the court what you have discussed unless you both agree to that approach. This allows you to work through options without having to commit to them until there’s an agreement. It can also mean the well-meaning friends/family in the background aren’t there, which can take away some of the pressures to listen to and please others.
• It is neutral: the setting for mediation is usually the mediator’s office or can be online so no one has the “home field” advantage feeling.
• It is almost always much less expensive than full-blown court proceedings: there is a cost to mediation where legal aid funding isn’t available, but the costs of fully contested court proceedings for children or financial matters on divorce are, very sadly, often extremely high financially and emotionally, whereas mediation can help keep these things at a much lower level.
• It is much quicker than the court process.
• It is in your joint control: what you talk about, how you approach it and how it ends is in the hands of the people mediating. Not a judge or another professional.  Whilst you might want the Court to make an order to formalise an agreement, getting to that agreement is in your control.
• It is worth a try: in most family breakdowns, one of the major contributing factors is a breakdown in communication and trust. Good quality mediation can go a long way to helping restore some of that for you and your family’s benefit.

What mediation is not

• It isn’t a competition: it’s a conversation between you and the other person with support from a mediator to encourage you to identify issues and find solutions from your own perspectives.
• It isn’t a court: the mediator isn’t judging or determining the outcome.
• It isn’t therapy: although therapy can run alongside it
• It isn’t compulsory: it is always a voluntary process. The Court can require you to have an initial information meeting (a Mediation Information and Assessment Meeting of “MIAM”) with a mediator to explore the pros and cons of mediation and consider whether it would be the best way for you to resolve issues with your ex but the court cannot force you to actually engage in mediation sessions with the other person after that.
• It isn’t binding: but you can decide together with the other person that you want to make the agreement you reach binding and invite the Court to assist in that regard.

Even if you aren’t sure mediation can help you, it is still worth speaking to a mediator, about how it might help, and if it helps resolve just one issue, it’s still one less thing you then need the Court or an arbitrator to decide for you and your family’s future.

For advice on mediation and all other forms of Court and non-court resolution, please contact Fiona Apthorpe or Belinda Moseley at Geldards.