Page 85 - Solving Housing Disputes

• the use of Settlement Conferences in the Cheshire and Merseyside Courts,
which are used to facilitate discussion of the issues and identify settlement
solutions outside of the purview of the family court process; 234

• the requirement that parties participate in a Mediation Information &
Assessment Meeting before making an application, save for in certain
235
circumstances; and

• the use of Financial Dispute Resolution (FDR), either privately or as part
of the court process, a form of early neutral evaluation where a judge offers
a preliminary view on the financial order the court would likely make, to
236
facilitate negotiation early in the court process.

3.53 Family law consultees we spoke to emphasised that what had traditionally been
understood as “ADR” is now the ordinary method by which family disputes are
resolved, with a very small percentage of financial remedy matters proceeding
to a final, contested hearing. Fundamental to these changes has been a desire to
search for a less adversarial, mediative method of resolving disputes.

3.54 The Government’s desire to abolish no fault eviction and promote longer
tenancies sets a framework to try a similar approach in housing disputes, where
longer, healthier tenant-landlord relationships could be sustained through the
normalised use of ADR techniques in court and tribunal processes. In those
circumstances, we ask whether all courts and tribunals dealing with housing
disputes should have ADR as the first port of call within the dispute resolution
pathway and be empowered to order non-consenting parties to engage with an
ADR process. Uptake of ADR generally remains tethered to party consent,

234 See ‘Settlement Conferences Protocol as to Basic Principles’, https://www.judiciary.uk/wp-
content/uploads/2017/07/protocols-and-annexes.pdf Hodges research suggests that over 500 cases have
been involved in Settlements Conferences, with a 70% success rate, ibid p. 319.

235 Where there is domestic violence or the risk of it, Children and Families Act 2014 ss1 and 10. It must
be acknowledged that there are problems with MIAMs; in 2017 the National Family Mediation (NFM)
reported that, based on its research, six out of ten couples were ignoring the need for a MIAM – just
35,627 of nearly 90,000 applicants having followed the MIAM process, available at https://www.famil
ylawweek.co.uk/site.aspx?i=ed182325

236 Family Justice Council, ‘Financial Dispute Resolution Appointments: Best Practice Guidance’
(December 2012) available at https://www.judiciary.uk/wp-
content/uploads/2014/10/fjc_financial_dispute_resolution.pdf

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