Transcript Unemployment and return to work after the diagnosis of a

East Midlands Platform
on food, physical activity and health
Members’ Meeting
Nottingham, 24 February 2012
The Responsibility Deal –
and Work, Health
and Well-being
Dame Carol Black
Expert Adviser on Health and Work
Department of Health, England
The Fundamentals
• Work and health are inextricably linked
• Work is a determinant of health
• People’s social and economic circumstances affect health
throughout life, so health policy must be linked to the social
and economic determinants of health
• Work is generally good for health
• Enabling people to be in productive work is a health issue
• Good health is essential for a high-performing workforce
• Worklessness is a greater risk to health than many ‘killer’
diseases
• Improving working-age health is the business of us all.
It is also a Public Health issue.
What we need in the UK
Healthy, engaged
workforces
Well-managed
organisations
• A high-performing, resilient
workforce
• Enhanced productivity
Contributing to:
• A well-functioning society
• Better economic performance
UK Employment and Health
Employed population
26% with a
health condition
or disability
Mental ill-health is the most common
reason for claiming health-related benefits.
2.4%
off sick
Inactive (about
a third as many
as are employed)
48% with a
health condition
or disability
Source:
Labour Force
Survey of
UK men and
women aged
16-64
Unemployed (about a tenth
as many as are employed)
29% with a health
condition or disability
Beneath these figures lie
diminished lives, little aspiration,
and disrupted families.
To achieve our goals we need to:
• Create employment and workplaces which both
protect and promote health, mental and physical
• Enable people with disabilities and long-term
conditions, especially mental health conditions, to
stay close to the labour market
• Reduce sickness absence, job loss, and flow onto
benefits
• Support people to work to a later age, and
• Above all, enable a change in culture, attitudes and
behaviour in connection with work
• Ensure that work is ‘good work’.
Election May 2010: new UK landscape
• Major reform of the NHS
• Public Health re-organisation
• Local Councils’ enhanced
responsibilities
• Public Health Responsibility Deal
• Major reform of welfare system
• Independent review of sickness
absence
“ We simply have to get
to grips with the sicknote culture that means
a short spell of
sickness absence can
far too easily become a
gradual slide to a life of
long-term benefit
dependency.”
Sickness Absence Review the ongoing journey
• The current system lacks coherence and wastes human and material resources.
28 weeks
Week 4
Work
39 weeks
ESA
20
Sickness
absence
benefit and support
Claim
Claim to
to
Employment
Employment
Support
Support
Allowance
Allowance
(ESA)
(ESA)
JSA
Work
Work
Capability
Capability
Assessment
Assessment
benefit and support
Work
Inactivity
We made recommendations to:
- support employees at work to stay in work
- improve the benefits system to offer better advice and support, towards work
- tackle sickness absence through various interventions, throughout process.
Our recommendations could also save £400 million a year for employers, £300 million a year
for the State, and boost economic output by over £1 billion per year.
The Power of the Workplace for
Health and Productivity Improvement
The potential for large-scale health impact:
• 27.5 million employees in the UK
• families of employees extend impact further
Advantages of the workplace:
• a microcosm of society, as to age, gender, income, ethnicity
• powerful communication and education structures
• a culture of health at work can reinforce positive health behaviours
(Public Health in the workplace)
• employer/employee relationships can sustain healthy behaviour
• infrastructure for measurement of health outcomes is often in place.
Also, we do not usually attend GPs’ surgeries for well-being advice.
Adjustments employers make for
employees to stay in work
Percentage of employers citing each
Allowing reduced or different hours
29
Meetings with employees to discus extra help
Measures used in the
last 12 months to help
keep employees with
health problems in
work or facilitate their
return to work:
28
Reducing employee workload
25
Different duties
22
Extra breaks
18
Phased return to work
17
Different chairs/desks
11
Access to OH services
9
Other specialised equipment
Building modifications
Job coach/ personal assistant
No measures provided ----
5
4
3
No measures provided
67
Source: Employer Survey, DWP
Positive Workplaces
Key features common to those organisations which have achieved
success in promoting health and well-being:
• Senior visible leadership
• Accountable managers throughout the organisation
• Attention to both mental and physical health improvements
• Systems of monitoring and measurement to ensure continuous
improvement
• Empowering employees to care for their own health
• Fairness
• Flexible work
Health and well-being need to be embedded in every
aspect of an organisation’s structure and work
The Responsibility Deal
“Public health is everyone’s responsibility and there is a
role for all of us, working in partnership, to tackle these
challenges.”
- Andrew Lansley, March 2011
We want to create an environment that supports people to
make informed, balanced choices & to lead healthier lives.
Businesses and other organisations can lead the way in
positively shaping & creating this environment to improve public
health.
They can make a difference through their influence over
the workplace, physical activity, food, and alcohol.
They can do this an employers, and through their commercial and community activities.
Over 330 organisations have already signed up.
Working together
The plenary group oversees development of the Deal. It includes senior
representatives from business, NGOs, public health and local government.
Plenary Group
chaired by Andrew Lansley CBE MP
Alcohol
Food
Health at Work
Physical Activity
Behaviour Change
Jeremy Beadles
Mark Bellis
Susan Jebb
Carol Black
Fred Turok
Paul Lincoln
Paul Burstow MP
Andrew Lansley CBE MP
Earl Howe
Simon Burns MP
Anne Milton MP
The alcohol, food, health at work and physical activity networks are
responsible for the Deal’s work programme in each of these areas. The
behaviour change network provides advice across the Deal as a whole.
The chairs, and Ministers supporting, each network are set out in the diagram
above.
Signing up as a
Responsibility Deal partner
To become a Responsibility Deal partner an organisation:
• signs up to all the core commitments & supporting pledges
• signs up to a minimum of one collective pledge [this can be an alcohol,
food, health at work or physical activity one]
• registers with the Department of Health online at
http://responsibilitydeal.dh.gsi.gov.uk
All partners, and the pledges they have committed to take action upon, are
listed on the Responsibility Deal website.
Any organisation – public sector, commercial, voluntary – which
can make a firm commitment to take action on at least one collective pledge
can sign up to the Responsibility Deal.
Responsibility Deal :
Health at Work network
The aim of the Health at Work Network – one of five
networks - is to find ways to help employers use the
workplace to improve the health of their employees.
Current work includes:
 Developing pledges for action to help people at
work lead healthier lifestyles. The Network has
agreed six initial pledges. Now we are publicising
them and encouraging uptake.
 Local Business Partnerships: Unilever, Mars UK,
Novo Nordisk, mentoring SMEs
 What works for SMEs
 Providing generic guides on managing chronic
conditions in the workplace
 Developing ways to make Occupational Health
more proactive and preventative
Health at Work pledges
Launched in March 2011:
-
H1.
H2.
H3.
H4.
Chronic conditions guide
Occupational health standards
Reporting on health and well-being
Healthier staff restaurants
Launched in September 2011:
- H5. Smoking cessation/Respiratory
health
- H6. Staff Healthchecks
Health at Work pledges
• Occupational health standards – we will use only occupational health
services which meet the new occupational health standards and aim to be
accredited by 2012/13
• Health and well-being reporting – we will include a section on the health
and well-being of employees within annual reports and on websites
• Chronic conditions guide – we will embed the principles of the chronic
conditions guides within our HR procedures
• Healthier staff restaurants – we will implement some basic measures for
encouraging healthier staff restaurants / vending outlets / buffets.
• Smoking cessation - we will facilitate on-site stop-smoking support
services and/or encourage staff to attend local stop-smoking services during
working time without loss of pay.
• Health checks – we will offer staff health checks, and/or encourage use of
the NHS Lifecheck, and participation in the NHS Health Check for vascular
disease, and other NHS screening programmes.
• To date 170 companies have signed up to one or more pledges.
H1. Chronic Conditions Guidance
Pledge
“We will embed the principles of the chronic conditions guides
(developed through the Responsibility Deal’s Health at Work
Network) within Human Resources procedures to ensure that those
with chronic conditions at work are managed in the best way
possible with reasonable flexibilities and workplace adjustments.”
Context
• There are many long term conditions, some of which are
increasing, such as diabetes and heart disease. So more
employers need to manage employees with these conditions.
• Employers will benefit from good management of chronic conditions
through improved productivity and attendance.
• Employees will benefit from improved health and make them feel
valued within the organisation.
The Guidance
• Two guides published to help
employees and employers in
the management of chronic
conditions in the workplace.
• Also linked to a number of
health websites, which offer
appropriate guidance on
specific long-term conditions.
• Available on NHS Choices at
http://www.nhs.uk/LiveWell/
Workplacehealth/Pages/work
placehome.aspx
H1. Mars Case Study –
Winning with Wellness
•
Have a positive attendance management
policy which is committed to making
reasonable workplace adjustments and
aims to be as flexible as possible to
support staff and to ensure that those with
acute and chronic health conditions are
managed in the best way possible at work.
•
Committed to making reasonable
adjustments and to creating modified return
to work plans and capability processes to
support staff with acute or chronic health
problems in the workplace.
H3. Reporting on Health and Well-being
Case Study - GSK
• Health Work and Wellbeing
included in annual Corporate
Responsibility Report
• Review of all uncertified and
certified sickness absence
data undertaken.
• Actions agreed to improve
reporting and support for
managers
New reports have highlighted trends
and costs not previously known.
Showing results
• After signing up, partners produce a brief delivery plan for each
pledge, to be published on the Responsibility Deal’s website.
• By April each year, partners submit updates on their progress.
• To guide partners in completing delivery plans and annual
updates, templates have been developed for all collective
pledges. These are available on the website.
• Partners’ pledge delivery plans and annual updates will be
published on the Responsibility Deal website.
• By Spring 2012 online submission of delivery plans and annual
updates should be available.
Contact us at [email protected]
Why sign up?
• A fitter, healthier workforce is more engaged and more
productive, performing more efficiently.
• A commitment to the Responsibility Deal sends out a positive
message about work culture, reputation and attitude to
employees and the workplace.
• It sends positive messages to those who use your services –
customers or clients - and the wider community.
• Being part of the Responsibility Deal network ensures you can
both contribute to and share the latest developments in the field
of health and work.
• RD events provide networking opportunities.
Further information
Further information about the Deal, including a full list of all the pledges and of
partners can be found at http://responsibilitydeal.dh.gov.uk/.
The website is currently being improved and expanded for partners and other
interested organisations. In the meantime more detailed information on the
Deal can found at
http://www.dh.gov.uk/en/Publichealth/Publichealthresponsibilitydeal/index.htm
We publish regular e-Bulletins to keep partner & other interested organisations
updated on the work of the Deal and to highlight interesting developments.
These can be viewed at
http://www.dh.gov.uk/en/Publicationsandstatistics/Bulletins/ResponsibilityDealbu
lletin/index.htm
Email us at [email protected]
Call us on 020 7972 4549 or 020 7972 4858
Final thoughts
“ Health is created in places where we
live, love, work and play. * ”
World Health Organisation