Children, young people and mediation

What's it all about?

If your Mum and Dad think you might want to see a mediator it's because they're having mediation.

Mediation is something that can happen when parents have difficult decisions to make and are finding it hard to talk about it. Basically what happens is that parents who are splitting up - or sometimes they have already split up - sit down with someone who is not involved (a mediator) and talk to each other.

It's the mediator's job to make sure that everyone stays calm and listens to what each other is saying. They also make sure that parents think about all the things that might need to be arranged when they split up and they usually write it all down in something called a Parenting Plan.

Sometimes parents can be a bit confused about what their children want and what is important to them. Often when parents are splitting up they act differently - some people shout more, some people cry a lot, some people act like unexploded bombs. There are lots of different ways that people can be when their life is changing and the future is not as clear as they thought it was. That's probably the same for you too.

So when parents come to mediation, we ask them if they think their child or children would like to see a mediator. And the reason we do this is because we think it's very important that you have a say about what is happening in your life and what's important for you in the future about your home situation.

How does it work?

What we don't want to happen is for your Mum and Dad to fall out about whether you should come or not. So we will only invite you if they both agree.

We let them know that if you come to a session it has to be because you want to, not because they think it's a good idea. Which is why we write to you to invite you - and it's not a problem for us if you decide you don't want to. Lots of children and young people do come though.

If you choose to come you can talk about whatever you want to. You may have questions for your parents or the mediator, you may want to say what you think about what is happening or you may just want to see what the mediator is like and find out what is going on.

Sometimes your parents will have asked the mediator to see what you think about some of their ideas and the mediator will explain this. You don't have to say though, your mediator will have explained to your parents that it's up to you what you talk about.

Whatever you say to the mediator is private, they will not tell anyone else unless they are worried about you or someone else getting hurt.

At the end of your meeting the mediator will ask you whether you want them to tell your Mum and Dad anything. If you want anything passed on, the mediator will talk to you to work out exactly what they should say.

What happens after that?

A few days after they have seen you the mediator will have another meeting with your Mum and Dad. If you have said you don't want anything passed on the mediator will let your parents know that the meeting happened and that you don't want anything passed on. If you have ideas that you want your parents to think about the mediator will tell them and they will talk about them. The mediator will then write to you again to let you know what has happened.