The online event was a great success, attracting over 70 delegates from across the UK and overseas. It featured an array of leaders in the field of mediation, including keynote speaker, Michael Jacobs, award winning author of the article Mediating Hearts and Minds and a panel featuring Victoria Harris, deputy chief executive of the Civil Mediation Council, prominent barrister Kelly Stricklin Coutinho and former BBC presenter Joanna Gosling.

The day was facilitated by Ness Collingridge and opened by the head of Strathclyde Law School, Professor Adelyn Wilson and the Mediation Clinic director, Charlie Irvine. Michael Jacobs’ keynote addressed the dilemma, “Mediation: Resolution or Peace,” challenging the standard focus on numerical results. Suggesting that “success is a powerful lure” he sees conflict as an enduring fact of life, to be lived with as much as resolved. Mediators can help people whose lives have been consumed by conflict to regain their humanity and live with difference without being “taken over.”

Other speakers included Professor Jane Bryan of Warwick University, Ewan Malcolm of Relate North West London, Rhona Wilson from Glasgow’s community mediation service, Ron Inwood and Marie Young from ACAS and Strathclyde Mediation Clinic practitioners Roy Poyntz, Gordon McKinlay and Patrick Scott SC.

The final panel offered a glimpse of the growing importance of mediation in the justice system of England & Wales. Kelly Stricklin Coutinho, who acted for the Civil Mediation Council in the highly influential Churchill case, explained its impact in enabling judges to insist on the use of mediation prior to trial. Ms Gosling described her journey from journalist to senior associate mediator in one of London’s leading law firms, Irwin Mitchell.