(a) No officer, employee, former employee, or other person officially connected or formerly officially connected to the Arkansas Mediation and Conciliation Service shall produce or present any confidential records of the service or testify in behalf of any party to any cause pending in any arbitration or other proceedings or court or before any board, commission, committee, tribunal, investigatory body, or administrative agency of the United States or of any state, territory, the District of Columbia, or the state or any municipality or political subdivision thereof with respect to facts or other matters coming to his or her knowledge in his or her official capacity, whether in answer to an order, subpoena duces tecum, or otherwise, without the prior written consent of the representatives of both parties to the dispute.

(b)

(1) Whenever any subpoena or subpoena duces tecum calling for confidential records or testimony as described in subsection (a) of this section has been served upon any officer, employee, or other person, he or she will appear in answer thereto and, unless otherwise expressly agreed to by the representatives of both parties to the dispute, respectfully decline, by reason of this section, to produce or present the confidential records or to give testimony.

(2) Immediately upon receipt of the subpoena, the mediator or former mediator or employee should contact the Director of the Department of Labor, who shall immediately notify the staff attorneys of the Department of Labor of the state to ensure that the procedures set forth in this subchapter will be followed. The director then shall instruct the staff attorneys to appear in behalf of the mediator and protect the service from any disclosure that violates the provisions contained in this subchapter.

(c) In the event that the court insists that the mediator testify or produce documents, the staff attorneys of the department shall be further instructed to take immediate steps to procure the release of the mediator pending an appeal from the court's decision.