2002 Edinburgh Sheriff Court

2.Main Content

2002 Edinburgh Sheriff Court

This page contains an outline of this research, and a summary of the key findings. Details of how to find the full report can be found at the bottom of the page.

Title
“Supporting Court Users: The In-court Advice and Mediation Projects in Edinburgh Sheriff Court, Research Phase 2”, Legal Studies Research Findings No. 38

What is it about?
An in-court advice service was introduced at Edinburgh Sheriff Court in 1997, and the following year a mediation service was formally linked with it. The mediation project offered arms-length negotiation, as well as face-to-face mediation; these two dispute resolution procedures were used by roughly equal numbers of clients. Details of the scheme can be found on Edinburgh Sheriff Court.

Who did it?
The research was commissioned by the Scottish Executive Central Research Unit and carried out by Elaine Samuel at the Department of Social Policy, University of Edinburgh. Phase 1 of the research assessed the demand and need for the in-court advice service, evaluated its capacity to deliver advice and support to unassisted litigants and explored its impact on the court.

Phase 2 of the research monitored the operation of the advice service and the newly linked mediation provision over nine months. Phase 2 was conducted between September 1999 and April 2000. Data was collected from the project’s client records; in addition, interviews were held with project workers, sheriffs and sheriff court employees; solicitors, representatives of advice agencies and mediation clients. It was published in 2002.

Key findings

In the nine months that were researched, 151 clients were referred to the mediation project (only one party in a dispute could be a client of the project, so this represented 151 actual cases). Of these, the majority (99) were referred by the in-court advice project. The remainder were referred by the mediation coordinator (18), Edinburgh Central CAB (15) and sheriffs (5).
More than one third of all In-court advice project clients with matters relating to small claims and summary cause cases were referred to the mediation project.
The majority of cases (16 out of 23) involved small claims litigants.
Most cases (more than 80%) involved monetary claims, also disputes over products and services (9%) and damages or personal injury claims (9%).
More than a third of cases involved individuals claiming against small businesses (35%); 26% involved individuals against other individuals, and 19% involved small businesses against other small businesses. Only one client referred to mediation was legally represented, although in 34% of cases the other party was represented.
More than half of parties referred agreed to take up mediation, but in only half of these cases did the second party agree to mediate.
Of the 151 cases referred during the researched period a settlement was successfully negotiated by the mediation coordinator in 21 cases, and a mediated settlement was reached in 20 cases out of the 22 that went to mediation.
Disputes were more likely to be brought to a successful resolution by assisted negotiation where 'first' parties were individuals and where clients had been referred to the mediation project before raising actions.
Disputes were more likely to be brought to a successful resolution by a mediation hearing where 'first' parties were small businesses and where clients were referred after raising actions.
Mediation hearings were found to be most appropriate when parties desired to maintain personal or business relationships.