The role of court-annexed mediation in providing access to justice in the resolution of commercial disputes

Abstract

Nowadays, parties in commercial disputes face various challenges as well as financial constraints. Due to limited financial resources as well as the abovementioned constraints, especially in small emerging enterprises/medium upcoming and growing companies, dispute resolution processes, specifically litigation, are not equally accessible to all. Companies are in dire need of an alternative, more cost-efficient and effective way of resolving disputes. The need for a cost-efficient and effective dispute resolution mechanism speaks to a company's right to proper access to justice. Therefore, the main issue is what must be done to assist a company that requires a more cost-efficient and effective way of resolving a commercial dispute. This paper focuses on court-based/annexed mediation and how it provides access to justice between jursitic persons in commercial disputes. This project is taken forward by studying the position as it pertains to access to justice as well as court-annexed mediation in the State of Victoria, Australia. Victoria is globally acknowledged to be an exemplary jurisdiction in this respect. The study describes various ways in which court-based/annexed mediation could assist South African companies to resolve commercial disputes and concludes that it would be more efficient to introduce the state of Victoria's application of court-annexed mediation into South African legislation, as it grants proper access to justice to companies engaged in commercial disputes.