Samenvatting

December 2008 over 2.000 lawyers were asked by an online questionnaire about their view on referral to mediation. The referral provision to mediation is well-known amongst lawyers; over 90% of the lawyers are acquainted with it. A majority of these lawyers sees court referral to mediation as a valuable supplement in general within the traditional court procedure. Some of them, however, see it as a valuable supplement in certain kinds of cases.There appears to be a correlation between experience with and attitude towards mediation: a lawyer who has gained more experience with mediation, for example by attending one or more mediation sessions, has a more positive view and as a result in the future he will recommend mediation to his client more often.In family law cases, a lawyer’s advice to use mediation as a tool to solve a conflict, is more often accepted by a client, then it is in commercial cases. Lawyers would like to see some improvement in the timing of the mediation proposal by the court. Sometimes a proposal comes too early, sometimes it comes too late.The cooperation between lawyers and mediators is assessed positively by 90% of the lawyers. However, lawyers who do not attend one or more mediation sessions would like to receive more information about the progress. On the other hand, lawyers are satisfied about the information exchange with their clients during the mediation process.