Teaching union calls for HSE to include suicides in work-related deaths figures

The union also said at its recent annual conference in Harrogate that mandatory, fully-funded mental health training should be introduced for all staff in schools and colleges.

NASUWT’s wellbeing at work survey, which received nearly 12,000 responses from teachers, found that almost a quarter of respondents reported drinking more alcohol due to work-related stress, while 12 per cent reported the use or increased use of antidepressants and three per cent said they had self-harmed as a result of their work. 

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“Furthermore, while suicides are one of the biggest causes of work-related deaths each year, they are not included in the Health and Safety Executive’s annual reporting or its inspection and protection regimes,” said NASUWT, adding that it believes “this exemption must be removed to help address the factors behind work-related suicides”.

Suicides that happen in the workplace, or are potentially linked to work-related factors, are not reported to HSE under its Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations 2013 (RIDDOR).

A spokesperson for HSE said: “Suicide is not reportable to us under current regulations. A coroner can refer a case to HSE if they consider there is an ongoing risk to others.”

The death of headteacher Ruth Perry, who took her own life in January 2023 while awaiting the results of an Ofsted inspection, sparked calls for HSE to investigate work-related suicides.

Writing in the British Medical Journal in May 2023, Martin McKee, a professor of European public health at the London School of Hygiene, and Sarah Waters, a professor of French Studies at the University of Leeds who specialises in work-related suicide and labour theory in France, said: “The Health and Safety Executive must investigate every work-related suicide, in whichever sector they occur, and ensure that work-related suicides are subject to the same requirements for reporting and prevention as other occupational deaths.

“It should also launch an immediate inquiry into work-related stress in the education sector.”

In France, wrote the professors, “if there is even a suggestion of a link between suicide and working conditions, the burden of proof falls on the employer to show otherwise”. They added that in the UK, “we do not even know with certainty how many teachers have killed themselves in circumstances linked to Ofsted inspections, but we are aware of at least eight others”.

Writing in Safety Management in October 2023, Phil Newton, an associate at law firm Pinsent Masons, said that work-related suicide is a “complex issue” because “there are often multiple reasons, related to matters inside and outside of work, why someone decides to take their own life”. Making changes in this area of law “may therefore prove challenging”, wrote Newton, although he added that calls for change “at least serve to put the question of compliance [with work-related stress mitigation obligations] in the regulatory spotlight.