Companies must help workers depressed by divorce, Iain Duncan Smith says

The Pensions Secretary said many people are struggling with depression and anxiety at work because of a “family break up” or a “hiatus” at home.

He said that the Government was going to “push” companies into becoming better   at identifying these problems and offering help before they get worse to help keep people in work.

The Department of Work and Pensions is currently expanding a pilot scheme to   help people on benefits with mental health problems get treatment earlier, as it tries to increase the numbers in work and reduce the benefits bill.

However Mr Duncan Smith said that Government and companies need to be better   at looking after the mental health of people still in work to keep them off  benefits in the future.

Speaking to people at an early stage when they exhibit early symptoms of   depression will stop “people crashing out of work”, he said.

He told the Work and Pensions Select Committee: “If you go to other countries   like Germany and others they have a much more proactive process in trying to   engage the worker at that point really, to find out what the problem is.

“Quite often they are really quite minor problems, they may be family   problems, maybe there is family break up going on, or a hiatus or something   that actually you can then deal with.

“They can be sent to some kind of help and support whether it is treatment if   they are suffering some kind of mental health condition early on,   stablilising them and keeping them in that job.

“So that is what we are now trying to focus our attention on is to get to   people much earlier where they are work where they start to show indications   of difficulty and start to get that treatment.”

“We would like to push companies even further to do more and we would like to   support them to a greater degree”, he added.

Mr Duncan Smith said that around 60 per cent of all those with mental health   conditions who leave work are suffering from anxiety or depression and the   Government needs to “do much more proactively help people get treatment.”

He said: “My general view is that we can do a lot more to help people much   earlier on, and so if you remember we started a programme, about helping   people who were in work at the time and health and work programme, because   we have never done anything like before

“What happens in private sector companies, particularly, is people suffer a   problem, then their work suffers, they cease coming into work regularly,   what happens is they go into their statutory sick pay and at the end of it   the business sort of says “bye bye.”

Norman Wells, director of the Family Education Trust,  the negative effects of   family breakdown health and productive work “is not always appreciated as   much as it should be. Likewise the positive benefits to health and   productivity of a stable and intact family life.”

“Iain Duncan Smith is undoubtedly correct in recognising that employers are   often among the first people to discern the tell-tale signs of failing   mental and emotional health and can play a valuable role in encouraging   colleagues under strain to seek medical help.

“He describes this as more proactive approach, but it is still a reaction to a   problem that has already begun to manifest itself. As a society we need to   be proactive at an earlier stage still.”

Tom Pollard, Policy and Campaigns Manager at Mind, the mental health charity,   said: “We welcome proposals to provide more support to people experiencing   mental health problems in work, but we also need employers to provide   greater tailored and personalised support to all staff, whether they have a   diagnosis or not.”

Read the full article here in The Daily Telegraph