Free Webinar - Mediations: When and how to get ready for them

This webinar, taking place during Mediation Awareness Week, looked at how to initiate an invitation to mediate, how to respond, positively or negatively to an invitation to mediate and how to prepare your client get the most out of the process, whether they are paying privately, or if there is a legal aid contract in place.

Speaker Panel

Kate Aubrey-Johnson, Barrister & Mediator, Garden Court Chambers
Parties have confidence in Kate as a facilitative and dynamic mediator. She has a high settlement rate and is regarded as patient and intuitive. She has a wealth of litigation experience and is able to deal with complex legal and factual issues. Kate believes that mediation allows for parties to reach creative resolutions and that the mediation process can offer meaningful and practical solutions for people in a dispute.

Kate is an active member of the wider mediation community, she is an accredited civil mediator, a SEND mediator for the award-winning KIDS SEND Mediation Service and she is an accredited community mediator. She has written widely on developments in mediation and is the author of Making Mediation Work For You (LAG, 2012).

David Watkinson, Barrister (Retired) & Mediator, Garden Court Chambers 
David is a founding member of Garden Court Chambers and was Joint Head of Chambers. While a practising barrister for 40 years (1973 – 2012) he represented clients in courts at all levels from the Magistrates' courts to the Court of Appeal, the House of Lords and the European Court of Human Rights. The cases included civil claims (including Judicial Review) arising from land and housing issues.

His various other capacities included being a member of the Civil Justice Council. His writings include being a contributing author to Gypsy and Traveller Law (3rd ed-2020). Since qualifying as a mediator, David has adapted his advocacy skills to the task of assisting parties in dispute to discover for themselves a solution acceptable to them. He has both represented clients at mediation, as well as mediating disputes. 

While his legal experience makes him suitable for housing, land or planning disputes, he does not regard his mediation practice as confined to those areas. David has the ability to find out the common ground between people who are in dispute and to enable them to come to agreement. His relaxed style gives parties confidence to engage fully in the mediation process and reach a resolution.

Helen Curtis, Barrister and Mediator, Garden Court Chambers
Helen is a trained, experienced mediator with ‘excellent interpersonal skills’ and an ability to ‘keep the focus on coming to an agreement’.  She is calm and relaxed from the first point of contact with the parties and her constructive approach acknowledges the parties’ needs at the outset. Helen helps parties reach a resolution in cases that are commercially sensitive, complex and where disputes involve a high degree of strong emotion or hostility. She brings skills required in litigation namely energy, insight and stamina to effective use in the mediation process.

Abigail Holt, Barrister and Mediator, Garden Court Chambers
Abigail has over 25 years of experience focusing mainly on accident, disease, health and medical-related issues. Abigail has been a fully trained mediator since 2011 and has also acted as a mediation advocate. Most recent mediation work has been in relation to complex PI cases which were not amenable to settlement by joint settlement meetings or commercial lease disputes. All such mediations resulted in the successful resolution of all issues, including linked Employment Tribunal cases and costs.

On numerous occasions, with the permission of the High Court, Abigail has performed the role of Court Examiner taking evidence on commission for the Court, in cases where Claimants have been too ill to attend for cross-examination at trial.