News

Mediate 2024 Conference: A reflection

With just a week to go before Scottish Mediation’s conference in 2025, and with it being in the middle of the conference season, my thoughts turn back to last year’s mediation conference which was held at the V&A Museum in Dundee. Looking back at my notes and reflecting on the day, some of my thoughts echo something that I have written about in an earlier blog. These are that we are so focused on delivering and developing services, supporting clients and thinking of new ways to help the people that we support, that we rarely take the opportunity to look around at the wider landscape, let alone trumpet our successes from the rooftops.

In looking at the wider landscape and hearing from others in the field, I am reminded of how, at the 2024 conference, we heard from the President of the Mediation Institute of Ireland. The President talked about how mediation has grown over the years in Ireland. We learnt that in recent years mediation has become embedded in some key pieces of legislation. We heard how a key step-change was the Law Reform Commission Report on alternatives to dispute resolution in 2010, which helped begin to shift thinking and set out mediation as an inexpensive and relatively quick way to sort disputes. Since 2010 mediation has become a word that is heard more frequently in Ireland, in international as well as local conflicts. It has a proven track record, with – in one area of mediation - some 70% of cases successfully resolved.

Restorative Justice podcast out now

To celebrate #RJWeek2025 we are delighted to launch our latest podcast. 

Listen to Ret. Sheriff David Mackie reflect on Scotland’s restorative justice journey. A long-time advocate of restorative practice, he shares his personal journey of discovering – and championing – the vital role restorative justice can play within the criminal justice process. 

Listen here: https://open.spotify.com/episode/60HyPdM2gtp2Xh7WqQvMhK

If you would like to learn more or take part in restorative justice process, contact infoscmc@sacro.org.uk

#RJWeek2025 

Autumn Newsletter now out

Our Autumn 2025 newsletter is now out. Here you can read about our future training events and how we plan on celebrating International Restorative Justice Week 2025. 

https://mailchi.mp/e77388644745/mediation-news-from-scmc-3253

“Ask what is strong, not what is wrong”

With less than a month to go before Restorative Justice week 2025, and with plans under way for the start of our Restorative Skills course next week, thoughts naturally turn to restorative justice.

It’s been almost a year since my first Restorative Justice Council conference, and the sense of hope that I took from that event is still tempered by frustration that Scotland has not yet turned policy intent into practice. What has moved on, however, is time, and with the Holyrood elections in 2026 fast approaching, there is a clear opportunity for political parties to take a fresh, evidence-based look at penal reform. And the evidence tells us that penal reform, if it is to effectively break the cycle of offending and reoffending, must include a measure of restorative justice.

Scotland and the rest of the UK continue to record the highest per-capita incarceration rates in Western Europe [1], but we already know the evidence for restorative practice is strong; so perhaps this time we need to ask ourselves, and our representatives, whether we are ready to act on it.