GMB Magazine GMB24 The Pulse Spring 2016 | Page 15

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WHY EMPLOYERS DON’T ACT
The HSE’s Stress Management Standards are
voluntary and inspectors can’t demand that
they’re applied. There are no specific
regulations on the management of stress and
mental health risks, and HSE inspectors have
been told that they should not take
enforcement action unless there is “…clear
evidence of a breach of health and safety
law, and a demonstrable risk to the health
and safety of employees.”
There has not been a single prosecution
for failing to manage stress, even though over
400,000 workers are made ill by it each year.
HSE inspectors can’t and won’t prosecute for
stress – the best they can do is issue an
improvement notice where either there is
no risk assessment, or the findings of one
have not been implemented. With no
prospect of punishment for employers,
many simply don’t bother about stress.

0

MAKING NO DIFFERENCE
Often, when employers do act on stress it
doesn’t make any difference. They treat stress
as a ‘wellbeing’ issue. ‘Wellbeing’ is a vague
phrase, isn’t linked to health, and often is
confused with some measure of worker
happiness. Even worse, many employers
focus on bringing the worker back to the
workplace without resolving the problem.
This usually takes the form of counselling,
followed by cognitive behavioural therapy
(CBT) or resilience training.
These methods might give the worker a
means to deal with stress, but it does nothing
to remove the source of the stress in the first
place. The causes of stress are not dealt with,
only the symptoms. Nothing is changed in the
work environment and excessive demands,
difficult relationships or any of the other
factors are never tackled. The more
employers take this approach, the worse
the situation becomes.

What to do about
workplace stress

GMB’s new guide contains a five
-point plan for
negotiating on stress and menta
l health. The five key
actions for GMB health and safety
reps, with the
support of GMB members, are:

1

Survey the workforce to identify how
much of an
issue stress is, and how many work
ers are affected
by mental health issues.

2

Raise this with the employer, through
the health and
safety committee or any other form
al consultation
meeting. If need be, ask for a specific
meeting – you have
evidence of a risk to the health of work
ers.

3

Develop a joint approach to tackle
stress. This means a
risk assessment using the Stress Man
agement Standards;
a stress and mental health audit; and
a clear, negotiated
policy on stress and mental health
risk management.

4

Act on the findings and implement
the policy.
Develop an action plan with clear prio
rities
including the need for a procedure
on
rehabilitation and return to work.

5

Monitor action and review progress
,
either through the health and
safety committee or at a specifically
convened meeting.

More details on each of these act
ion
points, including tools to help GM
B
health and safety representativ
es,
will be provided in the new guide.

GMB’S A