September 17, 2010
With employment tribunal rates spiralling and recession-related grievances climbing, Acas and the Trade Union Congress (TUC) have published a set of guidelines aimed at promoting mediation in employment claims.
According to the guidance, released earlier this month, there are a number of ways in which bosses can improve their working environment to help avoid legal action becoming the only way in which a dispute can be resolved.
The key benefit of mediation, Acas said, is that employees are more likely to remain in employment because the issue is dealt with early on, while full-blown tribunals can often exacerbate the situation for both affected and existing employees.
Mediation is recommended for bullying and harassment issues that are not always easy to deal with through formal procedures. Employers have also backed mediation for conflict resolution, claims Acas Chairman, Ed Sweeney.
“To be fair to a lot of employers, they were ahead of the curve because they could see it was another process to try to sort out some of the intractable problems that come up in employment relations,” he said.
With unions threatening strike action over government cuts, and a drastic spike in employment tribunal claims in recent years, Mr Sweeny was keen to stress that new ideas for solving disputes must be embraced.
“We can’t minimise some of the big changes that are going to take place with some of the potential cutbacks that the government is putting forward. But our job is to try to find the solution to those potential disputes,” he added.
