A minister said the UK’s approach to mental health had ‘gone too far’ and ‘normal life anxieties’ were being labeled an illness, sparking criticism from campaigners for mental health.
Mel Stride, Work and Pensions Secretary, said The telegraph that there was a “real risk now that we are labeling the normal ups and downs of human life as medical conditions which then actually serve to hold people back and ultimately drive up benefit bills.”
He continued: “While I am grateful for today’s much more open approach to mental health, there is a risk that it goes too far. »
Many organizations are guilty of ‘mental health washing’, investigation finds
He added that good attitudes towards mental health have changed, resulting in people who previously “suffered in silence” now receiving treatment.
However, he warned that “as a culture we seem to have forgotten that work is good for mental health” and that people were being fired too easily.
“If they go to the doctor and say I’m feeling pretty down and depressed, the doctor will give them on average about seven minutes and then in 94 percent of cases they will be declared unfit to do any work whatever be it,” Stride said.
Although he admitted that the subject was sensitive, he stressed that it should not become “a no-go zone” and that it was “a subject that we need to start having an honest and honest debate about.” adult “.
“It’s too important for people and their future, too important for the functioning of welfare and too important for the economy to ignore,” he said.
His comments come as official data published by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) reveals that at least 20,000 claims for incapacity benefits per year concerned mental health problems.
In addition, DWP figures also show that 69 percent of work capacity assessments carried out between January 2022 and November 2023 found a mental or behavioral disorder.
However, Sarah Hughes, chief executive of mental health charity Mind, said the minister’s comments “risk increasing the stigma around mental health”.
“Politicians and commentators need to think about the impact of their words on people facing exceptionally difficult circumstances,” she said. “Even though the latest figures from the DWP show an increase in the number of people unable to work (due to) mental health problems, the answer is not to force them to work anyway. »
Hughes said that for people with mental health problems to return to work, they need to receive “personalized support from experts… not threats of losing what little money they currently have to live “.
“That support simply doesn’t exist; with (more than) two million people on waiting lists for NHS mental health services, it is clear that the focus needs to be on improving the system,” she added.
Karl Bennett, Vivup’s Chief Wellbeing Officer and President of the Association of Employee Association Programs, said: Human ressources: “These comments struck me as a hot political issue where mental health is being used as a weapon to get people back to work.
“If (Stride) says conversations about mental health have gone too far, there is a lack of understanding of the benefits of discussing mental health.”
He added: “The people who are excluded from work are not the ones we should be focusing on in this conversation. These are the people who, unfortunately, may not have benefited from any safety nets put in place by their employers.
“The people we need to talk about are those who are opening up to their employers, to their peers, to their families – when they can because the veil of secrecy around mental health has been collectively lifted over the years .
As a result, Bennett said organizations that value their employees and their culture can do much more to support their employees: “With anonymized data, employers can identify issues that are keeping people away from work or not performing well. , ensuring proactive and preventive action. support so that individuals do not reach the point where they are approved by a GP.
But Petra Velzeboer, CEO and founder of mental health consultancy PVL, said: Human ressources: “I generally agree that people self-diagnosing are normal responses to the environments we find ourselves in – moving less, scrolling more, comparing, lack of practice in social situations, etc. . »
However, she added: “I would, however, be hesitant to agree with large-scale defined actions, where we label all people as self-diagnosing, because that would perpetuate the stigma attached to people who are truly struggling . »
Velzeboer also highlighted that greater “empathy” and “nuance” was needed for managers to discuss difficulties and that GPs rarely ask relevant questions about lifestyle or environment, and “often they simply quit when doing so may actually make symptoms worse.”
