Introduction
At Sage Mediation our focus is to put children’s needs first. We endeavour to help parents make sensible and sustainable decisions for their children’s arrangements. We offer an opportunity for children to have a separate meeting with Devorah to express their thoughts and feelings about the changes in their lives. This is called ‘Child Inclusive Mediation’.
Child Inclusive Mediation gives children of a suitable age the forum to express their feelings and wishes for the future. It also reassures them that their parents are taking their views seriously. Although we make it clear to them that they are not being given the power to actually make decisions, it can help their emotional adjustment a great deal just to say what they think and feel about their situation. We will check with the children exactly what information they wish to be fed back to the parents. We will then have a separate meeting with the parents at which the children’s views are reported back to them.
Child inclusive mediation
Child Inclusive Mediation offers children a safe and neutral space to be heard. The children’s true desires can then be taken into account when making decisions about any future child arrangements. Many families have found this to be an invaluable process.
Key points about talking to children in mediation:
- Both parents must give their consent
- Children do not have to attend if they don’t want to
- Children can be seen individually or together, whichever they prefer
- Children’s confidentiality is respected at all times, unless a serious risk of harm is shown to exist
- The mediator will agree with the children what views may be fed back to the parents
- Those views are fed back to the parents at a separate meeting
Child maintenance
There are different ways to arrange child maintenance and it’s up to you to choose the one that best suits your circumstances. During mediation we will be able to help you both work out the best structure for your child maintenance arrangements.
Since 2012 the Child Maintenance Service administers the new Gross Income Scheme whereparents are encouraged to put a private agreement in place.
In order to calculate how much child maintenance you should be paying or receiving please use the following calculator: https://www.gov.uk/calculate-child-maintenance
