Last week, Mediation Waitaki’s Marian Shore and one other mediator from Otago, attended a training session in Wellington run by the Resolution Institute, to get mediators up to speed for the changes coming to the Retirement Villages Code of Practice (2015), to come into use on January 1, 2017.
Mrs Shore said a key change was how aged care facilities worked to resolve disputes.
"If a standing dispute is not resolved within the organisation in 20 days, it must be offered to mediation.
"The type of things that covered were between resident and resident or resident and management.
"Clients must be offered mediation."
She said the alteration would allow mediators to come in and resolve issues or stop them escalating.
"I’d like to think it would be empowering for residents."
Dunedin’s Anja Klinkert, principal of Anja Klinkert Lawyer and Mediator, said the new process would give each affected party an opportunity to be heard.
"Whereas previously, there is a dispute, it was lawyer-up."
Ms Klinkert said there was an ageing population across the country that was doubling every few years, so legislation was needed to keep up with a possible increase in disputes.
"It’s going to cost the country money unless there is a process in place."
