Personal injury cases arising from stress

The case law summarised below demonstrates how, in the overwhelming majority of cases of serious psychiatric harm resulting from workplace stress, there are usually plenty of warning signs and opportunities to intervene before an employee reaches breaking point.

Frequently, the person is a vulnerable worker who returns to work following a period of ill-health absence and is then not properly supported over the long-term to help reintegrate properly back into the workplace.

Quite often, work has mounted up during the period of absence, promised help is not provided, colleagues are unsupportive, especially if their workload has increased as a result of the absence, and the reasons for the absence were not adequately explained, mentoring or support programmes are short-term or simply tail off, leaving the employee feeling isolated and struggling to cope.

Once an employee is back at work, the union rep can play a key role making sure that management provides the necessary on-going support and mentoring, and appropriate workload and responsibilities moving forward into the longer-term.