Mediation Advocacy is the technique of presenting and arguing a client’s position, needs and interests in a non-adversarial way. It recognises the following:-
the negotiated outcome to a dispute is usually more satisfying, more effective, more workable, more flexible and more durable than an order imposed by a court or other tribunal.

• the parties to a dispute should control its process and its outcome.
• the parties to a dispute should be assisted by their professional representatives or advisers in coming to a settlement that both deals with all matters in issue and also meets their true needs and wider interests
• parties to a dispute should have regard to helping the opposite party secure its needs while at the same time preserving their own.

The SCMA is a body of registered users comprising firms of solicitors and individual fee earners, sets of barristers’ chambers, sets of barristers’ chambers and individual legal, surveyor and construction professionals who represent parties in civil/commercial mediation within the common law jurisdiction of England and Wales and internationally in cross-border disputes. It is unique as being the only UK MA organisation to focus on the interests of the consumer of mediation services (whether court-annexed or private sector) by ensuring the quality of his or her representation, rather than advance and protect the interests of the mediator, with whom the rest of the UK mediation industry is concerned.

The scope of our activities extends to promoting mediation awareness among the judiciary, legal fraternity, commercial users, and general public; training mediation representatives to a certain quality threshold for which we accredit through the auspices of being registered as a UK Bar Advocacy Training provider; providing seminars and demonstrations to individual practitioners and firms; dealing with the Ministry of Justice, Civil Mediation Council and UK and foreign NGOs and Bar Associations who have an interest in this area by providing training and awareness to foreign governments, judiciaries and associations of lawyers and commercial users; publishing and disseminating research and new practices in this area.