News & Insights

Long gone are the days of ‘Children should be seen and not heard’ with greater effort now being made by the family justice system to ensure that a child’s wishes and feelings are sought, identified and put at the heart of decision making when parents separate.

With the majority of cases being settled out of court, we would encourage Child Inclusive Mediation, providing a platform to encourage parents to consider their child’s thoughts and concerns when agreeing future arrangements.

We see children without their parents present to promote an unpressured, informal environment so they feel able to speak freely about any concerns they have relating to their current situation and their hopes for the future, without the pressure of parents being upset. They then decide with the mediator what information is going to be fed back to their parents when the mediator next sees them. In many cases this feedback can be a true catalyst to the parents finding a resolution and understanding the impact of their actions on the emotional well-being of their child.

Seeing children as part of the mediation process requires specialist training. Laceys mediators have been seeing children as part of the mediation process for many years and find it the most rewarding part of their work.

Contact us

For further advice please contact one of our Family Mediation team.

This article is for general information only and does not constitute legal or professional advice. Please note that the law may have changed since this article was published.