Our mediators
All good? Then meet the panel...
Civil and commercial mediators
Martin is our Senior Mediator and the founder of mediation1st. His mediation style has been described as "subtle but powerful in bringing the parties together". Martin brings to each case the experience that comes from having mediated nearly 2,000 cases. He mediates primarily inheritance disputes, probate claims, and Trusts of Land Act claims, and is a full member of the Society of Trusts and Estate Practitioners. He also mediates contractual claims. Martin is a Fellow of the Civil Mediation Council and the author of Zen and the Art of Mediation, published by Law Brief Publishing. Click here for Martin’s full CV and details of his feedback, and here for his personal video. Martin mediates online, in central London, or in East Anglia.
Richard is a barrister of twenty years' call, and as well as being an ADRg accredited mediator he ranked as the top senior commercial mediator in the former National Mediator Database (previously maintained by Clerksroom) and he is a member of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators. He has a broad common law background, with particular experience in construction law, regulatory law, local government law, and land, leases and trusts. His manner is approachable and pragmatic (as a barrister he is Direct Public Access Qualified). Click here for Richard's full CV and details of his feedback and here for his personal video.
Mark comes with 18 years of experience as a mediator and around 100 mediations behind him. For his 28 years in practice as a solicitor, Mark had a broad litigation practice, which lends itself to being able to mediate a wide variety of matters. In more recent years, Mark acted in a number of high value contested inheritance matters, as well as property and trust claims, one confirming the law in the Court of Appeal. Another area of regular work was professional negligence. He is registered with the Civil Mediation Council and has previously assisted with the training of those qualifying into the mediation profession. Outside of the office, Mark has had two novels published. Click here to see Mark's full CV and client feedback.
Belinda brings unique experience and expertise to all types of commercial and civil disputes. After qualifying as a solicitor she gained over 25 years' experience of acting in house across a wide variety of commercial sectors. Her in house career started at Hogan Lovells and includes Merrill Lynch, Deutsche Bank and Citibank, and as a result she has experience both of advising clients and, as an in house lawyer, of actually being the client. This perspective gives her an enhanced understanding of all perspectives in mediation. Her mediation style is relaxed but always commercial and business like. Click here to see Belinda's full CV and client feedback, and here to see her personal video.
Stephen has over 30 years of dispute resolution experience, having worked as a solicitor in private practice with two major international firms and, subsequently, in-house as Head of Litigation in the Europe, Middle East & Africa region for Citigroup, the global financial services organisation. As a result, he has particular familiarity with banking and financial services-related matters, but his wider experience extends to just about every type of corporate / commercial / contractual dispute. Stephen stepped away from legal advisory work in 2024 to concentrate exclusively on mediating. Click here to see Stephen's full CV, and here to see his personal video.
Adrian has been a full-time litigation solicitor for over 30 years. There aren’t many types of disputes he hasn't seen. He has a calm, personable approach and uses his knowledge and experience of dispute to good effect in navigating parties through negotiation to lasting solutions. He says "being locked in dispute is so much worse than doing…well pretty much anything else really. It is a constant niggle that won’t go away - present in all the waking hours and many of the night time ones too." His quest is to navigate away from the stressful and uncomfortable journey the parties are on and to find what can often be, the elusive exit route. Click here to see Adrian's full CV, and here to see his personal video.
Everyone at mediation1st was deeply saddened by the death of our friend, colleague, and fellow mediator, Susan Blake, on Monday 9 June 2025. Our thoughts are with her husband Michal, and her family and friends.
Workplace Mediators
Lorna is our specialist workplace mediator. Lorna brings her extensive experience and expertise as an HR Manager and her specialist training in leadership and people management and development to her practice as a mediator, specialising in Workplace and Employment Mediation. Lorna understands the negative impact workplace conflict has not only on the individual employees directly concerned in the conflict but also on the business as a whole and appreciates how costly and disruptive workplace conflict can be. Lorna is also a qualified civil and commercial mediator.
Other mediators
Barley Dog
A veteran of several mediations, Barley adopts a problem solving approach to mediation. She believes that the problem in most disputes is essentially who should get the bigger share of the cake: her suggestion is that she should eat the cake, and then there will be nothing left to argue about. Barley can be booked to co-mediate with Martin, at no extra cost (though she says some dog treats would be nice). When not mediating, Barley's interests include food, walks, swimming, food, fetching objects thrown for her, refusing to return the objects she has fetched, food, digging up the flower bed, barking at people walking down her road, or on her footpath or through her village, and food. Oh, and did she mention food?
