Sainsbury Centre welcomes promise of more employment advisers in GP surgeries

27 November 2007

The Government's pledge to treble the number of employment advisers in GP surgeries is a major boost for working people with mental health problems, the Sainsbury Centre for Mental Health said today.

Welcoming the announcement by Peter Hain and Alan Johnson of a £13 million package of extra support including a new advice service for small businesses, Sainsbury Centre employment programme director Dr Bob Grove said: "The Government has shown commitment at the highest level to helping people with mental health problems to get and keep work.

"We know that many employers feel they get too little advice and practical support to tackle mental distress at work.  The new advice service will fill a major gap in the system.  We also know that GPs often lack confidence in helping patients with employment issues.  Expert advice within GP surgeries will be a major resource that we hope will give people with mental health problems the help they need to stay at work or to get back into employment after time spent out of the workplace.

"The Government has also pledged to ensure Pathways to Work and Improving Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT) will be linked up as both become national programmes in the next three years.  This is vital.  With the promise of more private sector provision of Pathways to Work services, the Government must ensure that providers link up with local health services and offer the same quality of care as the NHS currently provides in the Pathways to Work pilot sites.

"We welcome the pledge to pay providers of employment support for securing 'sustainable jobs'.  This should ensure efforts are made to support people to maintain as well as secure employment.  We hope contracts will also reward providers who use the proven system of Individual Placement and Support (IPS).  If they do not use this proven technique, the Government will miss the opportunity to include this important and significant group of people in its welfare reform programme.

"People with mental health problems still face massive barriers to getting and keeping jobs.  The challenge for government will be to make the many initiatives it has begun add up to something more than the sum of their individual parts and transform the life chances of all people with mental health problems."

The Department for Work and Pensions and the Department of Health today announced investment of £8 million in a new employer advisory service and £5 million in an expansion of its scheme to provide employment advisers in GP surgeries.  The DWP additionally published plans to increase the number of private sector providers of employment support for people who are out of work.

The Sainsbury Centre recently published Work and Wellbeing, which called for more support to GPs to keep people with mental health problems in work.