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Mediation works because it's led by human interaction. But that doesn't mean that the humans involved should ignore beneficial technology, including AI, to help the parties get to a beneficial outcome and ensure that all opportunities to settle are considered.
How I use AI in your mediation
I use an AI tool to help me prepare for your mediation, and you won't notice it. You don't log in to anything, install anything or fill in anything extra. The mediation is run by me, in the usual way, with the same attention to you and to what matters to you.
The tool is called Safe Harbour. It's a private workspace that I built and only I use. It saves me hours of sorting and cross-referencing, so I can spend that time on the people.
What it does, and what it doesn't do
Before the day, it helps me to:
• read, organise, and summarise the papers, any bundle, and position statements
• build a chronology and case summary, and list who’s involved and how
• schedule and organise meetings, with invitations and safe room allocation
• map the issues and the points where the parties differ
• plan the day, the rooms and the order of conversations
• identify hidden areas to explore further with questions
• isolate the likely costs recoverability at mediation vs trial or later
• trigger ideas for progressing the mediation, live on the day
• check figures and keep track of offers as they're made
It doesn't:
• decide anything, or tell me or anyone else what the answer is
• judge who's right or wrong, or give legal advice or evaluate the legal case
• sit in on the mediation, listen to it or record it
• speak to you, or to the other side
I read what it produces and check it against the papers before I rely on it. I stay fully responsible for the mediation. It's strictly neutral, like me.
Your choices
Behind all of this, I'm still the human in the room, and the conversation is led by me being present with the parties. That presence is essential.
If you'd rather I didn't use AI on your papers, tell me before the mediation and I won't. The mediation will go ahead in just the same way, with a bit more of my own reading time.
You can also ask me at any point which tools I use and how. Just ask, there's no wrong question.
Confidentiality and your papers
The central point of mediation is confidentiality. Everything stays under the confidentiality terms of the Agreement to Mediate, and using the tool doesn't change the without prejudice or privileged status of anything.
• Your case is kept separate from every other case.
• What you tell me in confidence is never passed to the other side through the tool, or in any other way, unless you ask me to.
• I use only AI services whose terms don't allow them to train on, or keep for their own purposes, what I send them. Using it doesn’t waive privilege or make anything public.
• When the mediation is over, I destroy the papers and my notes, as the Agreement says.
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