This means National Family Dispute Resolution Week and the idea is to promote dispute resolution in the context of family disputes. In other words; Family Mediation, Collaborative Family Law and Arbitration.

National Family DR Week  will be taking place this year between 25-29 November. By unfortunate coincidence this is also Domestic Abuse awareness week. This is such a shame because this clash may well reduce the effectiveness of both weeks.

Of course, as someone who has years of experience both as a mediator and as a Solicitor with special expertise in assisting the victims of abuse, the last thing that I would want to do is to encourage those who are victims of abuse into a mediation process that is unsafe.  I will talk more fully about mediation and safety in a forthcoming blog. Suffice to say, that before setting up a mediation, I will always undertake a thorough risk assessment. But I hope the victims of abuse will not in any way feel pressured to attempt mediation.

Whist the timing this year is unfortunate, National Family DR Week is a very worthy event indeed.

We have signed up to DR week. There is a website at the end of the following link; DR Week Website As I write, we are recorded on the list as “Family Law and Mediation Solicitors” rather than “Ian Walker Family Law and Mediation Solicitors” which is our trading name. I have asked for this to be corrected. But we are certainly in the list.

Basically, the idea is that (more…)