The UK's first major rewrite of the Acas Code of Practice on disciplinary and grievance procedures in nearly 20 years would bring mediation under the Code's penalty regime — exposing employers to a possible 25% compensation uplift or reduction if they unreasonably skip it. A formal consultation on the proposed rewrite opened last week.

The new draft Code runs to 95 paragraphs, up from 47 in the current version. The pivotal change sits in the final six paragraphs: a simple transposition of the encouragement to address workplace grievances through mediation from the Foreword into the main body of the Code. That shift matters because the body of the Code carries the penalty regime attached to it.

What does the change mean for employers?

If the revised Code is implemented as drafted, employers should treat mediation — including permutations such as facilitated conversations — as the default starting point for a workplace dispute, not just one possible outcome. A failure to start there could lead directly to claims for an uplift in compensation. Some employers already work this way; the rest will need to catch up quickly.

The change also reframes the grievance conversation, moving it away from who did what to whom in the distant past and toward what has to happen now so everyone can move on. It reduces the need for fault-finding, a bruising process that generally leaves no one untainted.

Why does this matter for AI-assisted grievances?

The proposed change may blunt the rise of lengthy AI-assisted complaints. AI can generate endless "areas of concern," but it struggles to tell an employee when he is or ought to be content with a particular proposal for resolution. The employee must do his own thinking, and nothing concentrates the mind quite like that.

Mediation's first question — irrespective of what the employee says led to this point, what do you need to get past it? — cuts through complaints that recite long lists of petty miseries going back a decade but are noticeably light on what the complainant actually wants done.

It also helps with grievances used as weapons against the employer or colleagues. Few employees will openly admit they want a colleague to suffer; instead they tend to convert it into a more workable proposition. That can be the difference between "I want my manager to stop bullying me" — a legitimate aim — and "I want him sacked," which very definitely isn't.

What do the draft provisions actually say?

The mediation provisions span paragraphs 90 through 95:

• Paragraphs 90 and 94: mediation is not appropriate in all cases.
• Paragraph 91: the independent third party should be "an accredited mediator or trained facilitator who is impartial and does not take sides" — external or a trained internal individual. That suggests employer investment, either pay-as-you-go external professionals or training internal practitioners. No employment law expertise is necessary.
• Paragraph 92: either party can suggest mediation or a facilitated conversation at any stage, and the process is voluntary — at least as voluntary as any decision carrying potentially large adverse financial consequences.
• Paragraph 93: if mediation is agreed, any imminent or ongoing formal disciplinary or grievance procedure should be paused.
• Paragraph 95: "These processes may not be available in every organisation but it is good practice to offer them in appropriate cases where possible." The circumstances in which it will genuinely not be possible are very limited.

What's the bigger picture?

The mediation community has sought this change for years. It may also ease current delays in the employment tribunal system: if the Government won't spend money on the problem, it can at least relieve pressure at the bottom of the system. Not every successfully mediated dispute would otherwise have become an ET claim, but many now won't.

HR teams will want to watch the consultation's outcome closely. The more employers that embrace mediation as a front-foot tool, the sooner the benefit of a resolution culture will work through — and the sooner AI-assisted grievance volumes stop being someone else's problem.