Extra £1.3m to help couples use family mediation scheme

The government is providing an additional £1.3 million to enable more separating parents use the family mediation scheme.

The extra investment is expected to help families resolve disputes away from court, such as those involving financial or contact arrangements for children and takes investment in the initiative to more than £3m since its launch in March last year.

The new funding will provide 2,440 additional vouchers for mediation services – each worth £500 – with the aim of finding amicable solutions to couples’ disagreements and freeing up space in the family courts.

It seeks to spare couples the stress of going through often lengthy and costly courtroom battles, which can have a damaging impact on their children.

Mediation is often a quicker and cheaper way of resolving disputes. It involves couples working through their differences – led by a trained and accredited mediator – to reach agreements they are both prepared to accept, such as how to split assets or arrange child contact times, rather than have a judge decide for them.

Since its launch, 4,400 vouchers have already been used under the scheme with 77% of cases reaching full or partial agreements away from the family courts.

Initial research from the Family Mediation Council (FMC), which runs the scheme, shows promising results. Of the first 2,000 cases using the vouchers, more than three-quarters reached either a whole or partial agreement outside of court.

Nearly half say they would not have considered mediation if the voucher had not been on offer.

Information about the scheme and how it works is provided to parties at their Mediation Information and Assessment Meeting (MIAM), which all those involved in family cases are required to attend, unless they have a valid exemption.

The extra money will allow the scheme to run until the end of March. If a case is eligible for vouchers, the mediator will automatically claim back the contributions from government.

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