ABSTRACT
Over the past two years, there has been a substantial expansion of community mediation. This has in part been a response to the growing incidence of neighbour nuisance. Local authority environmental health services are becoming deluged with neighbour noise complaints. In 1992-93 there were 3,317 domestic noise reports per million of the population,34 a 20% increase over the previous year. The trend shows a sharp increase, with nearly double the number of complaints being received compared with five years before, in 1985-86.35
A research paper on disputes between neighbours reported in 1986 that Birmingham City Council received over 8,200 cases of neighbour nuisance each year. This meant that nine new cases were received every month, and housing assistants spent several hours every week dealing with neighbour disputes. They had experienced a steep increase in the number of cases over recent years, and also predicted that things were going to get worse.36 This report also highlighted the inadequacy of traditional approaches to neighbour nuisance, and suggested that more use should be made of mediation, with its potential for changing the complainant-offender relationship. It quoted encouraging results from the first two mediation services in the UK, in Newham (London) and Sandwell (West Midlands).
