In public law, as in other areas, the Government and the courts have, in the past few years, repeatedly attempted to encourage parties to use alternative dispute resolution (ADR) in preference to ordinary litigation. On 23 March, 2001, the erstwhile Lord Chancellor’s Department issued a pledge that all government departments and agencies would use ADR “in all suitable cases wherever the other party accepts it”.
The courts have been keen to back this up. In Frank Cowl and others v Plymouth City Council [2002], Lord Woolf said: “Today, sufficient should be known about ADR to make the failure to adopt it, in particular when public money is involved, indefensible. This case will have served some purpose if it makes it clear that the lawyers acting on both sides of a dispute of this sort are under a heavy obligation to resort to litigation only if it is really unavoidable.”
