News

Service Spotlight - September 2024: Scottish Borders Mediation Service

The population of Scottish Borders is 115,240. There are 5 localities in the Scottish Borders: Eildon, Tweeddale, Berwickshire, Cheviot, Teviot & Liddesdale and Tweeddale. 

Hawick and Galashiels are the most populated towns with 13,586 and 12,302 people respectively, followed by Peebles (8,581), Kelso (6,861) and Selkirk (5,458).

Being a rural community, the obvious challenge for maintaining services is the geographical spread of the area.

There are no Council properties in our area as all of these were sold to Registered Social Landlords (RSL’s) in the early part of this century.

Until 2021 we employed one full time Mediator, it was early in that same year that the person in that role moved on to another post. This seemed the appropriate time to review what we could offer and improve on in relation to the Mediation Services in the Scottish Borders.

We realised that having just one point of contact meant there were many occasions Mediation could not be followed up in good time to ensure it would have a good chance of success.

We did hire for one case in the early days when we had no Mediator. I found this to be quite expensive for what was achieved and after evaluating it we decided that in house Mediation was best for us.

Fortunately, we have very good working relationships with all the RSL’s and have a tried and tested information sharing protocol and policies and procedures in place. 

We meet at a strategic level 4 times per year and it was agreed at the first meeting after this that we would cross train all 4 Antisocial Behaviour Officers, one of the largest RSL’s who also have 2 ASB Officers also agreed to cross train in Mediation, one other RSL have a trained Mediator.

All- in -all, that gave us much more capacity than we previously had, and the early signs are good because there is contact with clients within a few days at most and no rejections due to capacity.

We have set up our own network for Mediators that have been accredited, this has now been established and called the Scottish Borders Mediation Network (SBMN) and we will meet quarterly to share best practice and develop policies and procedures specific to Mediation.

Referral procedures are well established and information about Mediation is on the Scottish Borders Council website. The default is for referrals to the Mediators in the first instance with the RSL’s being able to plug gaps on an ad-hoc basis.

Officers will not mediate in the same area that they have responsibility for antisocial matters. This is easy to achieve as there are geographical “Area’s of Responsibility” (AOR) for each Officer which divides the Borders into three parts. The Senior ASB Officer is also able to cover for any potential conflict of interest for officers.

The geographical split is North/South/East, and this reflects the Police and RSL areas, this is good for establishing relationships and networking. It is also an effective way of maintaining the complete independence of the Mediation from other areas of business.

The fact that all Mediators in the Borders have gone through the same accreditation at a national level, training which is high quality and very well delivered, ensures Officers in the Borders can work to a common standard. This is critical and is beneficial for us in the Borders as we work for separate organisations but have close working relationships. The standards are National and not parochial in a Borders context.

Gratitude to the Scottish Community Mediation Centre and the Network meetings for keeping us up to date and allowing us the opportunity to stay “fresh” in our recent acquired accreditation as Mediators.

At the time of going to print we have the following as a network of Mediators within the Scottish Borders:

Scottish Borders Council
3 Antisocial Behaviour/Mediation Officers
1 Senior Antisocial Behaviour/Mediation Officer

Scottish Borders Housing Association
2 Antisocial Behaviour/Mediation Officers

Waverley Housing Association
1 Mediation Officer (This is a back - office person with other duties)