Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment the Government has made of the potential merits of allocating funding to businesses to provide training to employees on the early signs of poor mental health in the workplace.

The Stevenson/Farmer review of mental health and employers, published in October 2017, set out a series of recommendations. At its heart is an appeal to employers to adopt the “core standards”, which would make a real difference to the mental health support to people at work. A Leadership Council is driving adoption by sharing best practice and encouraging peer to peer conversations.

There is limited evidence on whether financial incentives can make a difference to adoption of health and wellbeing measures at work. We are supporting the evaluation of a trial led by the West Midlands Combined Authority testing whether financial incentives can be used to incentivise SME employers to take action along a health and wellbeing programme for SMEs. Final results will be published in due course.

Through our Challenge Fund we have funded a range of initiatives to help people with mental health and Musculoskeletal conditions stay in work. The Fund, which drew to a close in April 2020, funded 19 Initiatives to learn from different approaches that supported both individuals and employers. The learning will be used to inform future policies that are aimed at helping people with mental health and/or musculoskeletal conditions to retain employment.