Scottish Government

Main Findings

• Mediation has a high proportion of positive outcomes, although outcomes recorded by mediation services are not necessarily consistent with the views of participants.
• Legal action may produce positive outcomes in the short term for neighbours affected by anti-social behaviour, but may displace problems into other areas.
• In terms of neighbour disputes, noise is the main presenting problem for mediation services.
• Unlike most of the cases dealt with by mediation services, legal action cases are generally more than neighbour disputes and involve a range of other problems within a household.
• Mediation cases cost on average under 200, 15 times less than the average legal case.
• There is great variation in the costs of legal action, depending on the amount of evidence required and the organisational arrangements, for example the use of specialist investigation teams.
• People who turn down offers of mediation do so because they do not wish to engage with the other party to the dispute, because they fear escalation of the dispute or reprisals, or because they seek an external judgement on the case which mediation cannot provide.

Aims and Research Methods

A growing number of community and local authority mediation services deal with neighbour disputes. Mediation aims to produce sustainable agreements, avoid costly legal procedures, enhance communication skills, and to encourage people to take responsibility for resolving disputes. Increasingly, mediation forms part of a process of tackling a dispute that may ultimately culminate in legal action. The aims of the study were to provide evidence about mediation and other approaches to the resolution of neighbour disputes in Scotland, and to draw conclusions about the effectiveness and costs of mediation compared to legal remedies such as actions for repossession and anti-social behaviour orders. An additional objective was to investigate the reasons for refusing to take part in mediation.

The main research methods used were analysis of 100 cases from two community mediation services and two local authority mediation services, and 50 legal proceedings cases (action for repossession, anti-social behaviour order and interdict) from seven local authorities. In addition, parties to mediation were interviewed to compare their view of outcomes with those recorded by mediation services. Housing officers who make referrals to mediation, and a small number of people who had opted not to take part in mediation, were also interviewed. Additional data was collected from police and environmental health services.

Nature and Outcomes of Mediation Cases

The mediation cases examined generally involved mildly anti-social behaviour or serious personality or lifestyle clashes. In most cases, the main presenting issue was noise, either noise of domestic appliances, children, dogs, and other 'normal' living, or noise of parties and loud music. A smaller number of disputes originated in disputes between children, with which parents had become involved, or disputes over boundaries and upkeep of common areas. Cases remained live in mediation services generally for between two weeks and two months. Half of the cases included at least one party who was not a council tenant. Face-to-face mediation was used in around one-third of cases. Although most referrals to in-house mediation services came from council housing services, community mediation services received many self referrals and referrals from environmental health and police officers.

Routes to tackling neighbour disputes

In 61 percent of cases, the outcome recorded by the mediation service was either full or partial agreement or some improvement in the situation. In just under half of these cases (in 28 percent of all cases), the mediation service recorded an agreement on all presenting issues. Mediators themselves, however, suggest that there are likely to be positive outcomes which cannot easily be measured in terms of improved relationships and capacity to handle disputes in future, even in 'unsuccessful' cases. The profile of interventions, outcomes and costs varied significantly between mediation services.

From the perspective of participants, outcomes recorded at the close of a case are not necessarily a reliable guide to the longer-term outcomes. Although outcomes may be better or worse than those recorded, the proportion of positive outcomes recorded by some mediation services appears not necessarily to reflect the experience of participants. Participants' views demonstrate some of the challenges facing mediation, but show a generally positive view of the process, even where it does not bring the desired outcome. A number of participants, however, have found the mediation process more traumatic than might be expected.

Nature and Outcomes of Legal Action

All legal action cases studied involved serious and protracted anti-social behaviour, often including fighting, verbal abuse, swearing and damage to property. In most cases, it involved the perpetrator and visitors or family members, and in all cases it affected more than one neighbour. In many cases, there was a history of criminal convictions and/or mental health and/or alcohol-related problems. These cases in general were quite different to those found in mediation services. The seriousness of the behaviour was reflected in the length of time from decision to take legal proceedings to an outcome; this was usually several months, and often one or more years.

Most legal cases had a positive outcome for the neighbours affected, resulting in eviction, transfer or an anti-social behaviour order against a perpetrator. Several cases were 'solved' in the short term by the perpetrator moving away, being imprisoned, or being offered a community care package. In only two cases were proceedings dropped due to evidence of improvement in the situation. The majority of anti-social behaviour orders examined were breached, but only some breaches were then prosecuted. In legal cases, it is particularly difficult to assess long-term outcomes.

Costs

From the 100 mediation cases studied, the average cost of handling a case was 128, with a maximum cost of 484. From the 50 legal cases, the average cost was 3,546, with a range from 339 to 13,692 for a very complex eviction case. These are net (case-specific) costs, however, and would be considerably higher if overheads were included. Average costs of ASBOs and repossession actions (where an ASBO was not in force) were approximately 2,250 and 9,000 respectively.

These figures should be read in the context of the diverse organisational arrangements found; that is, the costs depend on the proportion of work carried out by a specialist team with its own budget, or by housing managers, where costs are likely to be absorbed. Legal action costs far more than mediation, due to the seriousness of disputes, but also to the procedures required in order to prepare a case for possible court action. There are local variations in the amount of evidence generally thought to be necessary for a strong enough case.

Reasons for Declining Mediation

In terms of unwillingness to take part in mediation, or to see the process through to a conclusion, the main reasons given by refusers themselves were

• unwillingness to engage with the other party
• fear of reprisals
• belief that the other party did or would manipulate the process or the mediators
• fear of an escalation of the dispute, and
• the desire for a definitive judgement on their case.

An additional reason why people refuse mediation, which was offered by staff who make referrals, was refusal to take responsibility for solving the problem themselves.

On the whole, refusers did not see taking legal action on their own behalf as a viable alternative course of action, but sought intervention from authorities such as landlords.

Lack of information about mediation or lack of confidence in mediators did not appear to be significant reasons for refusing mediation.

Conclusions and Recommendations

Although mediation will not be sufficient to deal with serious anti-social behaviour, which is associated with alcohol and drug abuse, mental health problems or criminal activity, its cost effectiveness suggests that there is considerable scope to extend mediation in the area of neighbour disputes.

Based on its conclusions, the report made the following recommendations:

• for housing, police and mediation services to work together to raise awareness of mediation among all staff who may come across neighbour disputes, and to ensure that they have a sufficient understanding of mediation to convey this to potential participants;
• for all mediation services to ensure that they have robust monitoring and evaluation systems in place, which allow for comparison between services, and for accurate monitoring of medium-term outcomes, including the views of participants;
• to carry out detailed research into:

a. the degree to which, even if it does not resolve the dispute, mediation can prevent escalation in cases of anti-social behaviour;
b. how mediation is used in disputes that are serious, or complex or involve vulnerable participants, and its potential for expansion in this area;
c. the medium and long-term outcomes of anti-social behaviour orders and other legal measures.