Two regional mediation pilot projects have been launched in a bid to help resolve workplace disputes in small-to-medium-sized companies before they reach the employment tribunal stage.
Cambridge and Manchester will be the first areas to create mediation networks, which will each consist of 24 SMEs that will be selected later in the year. The Department for Business, Innovation and Skills will fund mediation training for workers at each of the organisations involved, with the aim of building up expertise in which other companies in the region can tap into.
Employment Relations Minister Ed Davey, who unveiled the plans today, attested that employment tribunals should be seen as a “last resort” when dealing with workplace disputes.
“Mediation offers an informal method of dispute resolution and can be used at the point when problems first arise in the workplace,” he said. “For both employers and employees, it can mean avoiding the need for formal discipline and grievance procedures. And it can also mean avoiding the time-consuming, complex and often stressful employment tribunal process.”
Because SMEs were “often not aware” of the benefits of mediation, the goal of the pilot was to target them directly in order to “reduce the burden on the tribunal system”, Davey added.
The pilots, which were first mooted in the Coalition Government’s response to the ‘Resolving Workplace Disputes’ consultation, are scheduled to run for 12 months. If successful, they are likely to be introduced in other areas of England, Scotland and Wales too.
There were 218,000 tribunal claims in 2010/11, a rise of 44% on 2008/09. Each employer spent an average of nearly £4,000 per claim in defending themselves, while the taxpayer paid out £1,900 per claim.
