Mediation: access all areas?

• Significant civil justice reform expected.
• The need to revisit Halsey and its ‘denial of access to justice’ objection.
• Laying the foundations for ADR reform and, in particular, compulsory mediation.
• An old-fashioned approach?

With Sir Geoffrey Vos taking over as Master of the Rolls this month, he is expected to introduce significant civil justice reform. He has described himself as ‘a sympathetic critic of the Woolf reforms’ and has dubbed the reforms as ‘inadequately revolutionary for their time’.

He has also been a prominent speaker on the need for improved efficiencies in the court system to promote greater access to justice. The issue of compulsory or non-consensual alternative dispute resolution (ADR), in particular compulsory mediation, is expected to be high on his reform agenda.

Until recently, the widely understood and established position has been that, while the courts would encourage parties to use ADR and would impose heavy costs sanctions on a party that unreasonably