Natasha Devon: Job coaches in mental health wards may do more harm than good

17 October 2024, 14:55

By Natasha Devon MBE

@_NatashaDevon

Yesterday, Secretary of State for Work and Pensions Liz Kendall announced that job coaches could visit patients on mental health wards to give CV and interview advice.

According to the DWP, this has already been trialled with ‘dramatic results’, which led them to believe a wider rollout would be effective. It’s worth noting however (as pointed out by the Director of Policy at MIND, Minesh Patel) that we have yet to see the full details of the scheme and the results of the trials.

The word ‘dramatic’ could be doing a lot of heavy lifting here, especially as Kendall has hinted that this would come alongside further cuts to disability benefits.

Disability campaigners are, understandably, aghast at the plans. Mikey Erhardt of Disability Rights UK told the BBC ‘it is ridiculous to try and turn a hospital, a place of care and support, into a business setting’.

As someone who has been campaigning on mental health issues for more than fifteen years now, this was my initial reaction, too. I think of the numerous times when I have visited mental health inpatient facilities and struggle to think of anyone I have met there for whom a visit from a job coach would be of benefit.

In fact, there’s a very real possibility that it could have made them worse, compounding their internalised stigma – the guilt and shame most of us feel for experiencing psychological issues in a society which often jumps to the conclusion that we are lying, or exaggerating, when we speak about them.

But then I thought – poverty is the number one vulnerability factor in all ill health, whether physical or mental. If you are in the bottom 20% income bracket in the UK you are three times more likely to develop mental ill health, according to the Mental Health Foundation.

Perhaps, then, a job coach who is sufficiently (i.e. extensively) qualified in mental health, who has the deftness of touch, flexibility and empathy to do perform the role well and to work alongside the other elements of a patient’s recovery, could be positive for some. Of course, it won’t be a suitable option for everyone.

Ultimately, whether or not there is wisdom in this plan relies on the implementation. Will these job coaches be able to identify which patients are suitable candidates for their services? Or will they apply a broad, one-size-fits-all approach and blame the severely unwell people they purport to serve when, inevitably, it doesn’t work?

I hope at least they will receive more training than some of the employees at DWP callers to my LBC show have described, who apparently ask people with a-typical or rare disabilities whether they can lift a pen and assess their ability to work on that basis.

If this policy was being announced by Kendall’s predecessor Mel Stride, I’d be instantly opposed. After all, this was the man who claimed mental health awareness had ‘gone too far’ adding that “there is a real risk now that we are labelling the normal ups and downs of human life as medical conditions which then actually serve to hold people back and, ultimately, drive up the benefit bill.”

Little wonder, with political rhetoric like this, that a recent report from MIND found that levels of stigma around mental health have been set back to 2009 levels.

He also repeatedly claimed ‘work is good for mental health’, when the truth is more nuanced than that. Where a job is suitable (and employers and colleagues are prepared to be compassionate), a job can give people struggling with their mental health the structure, routine and purpose which can aid recovery. Forcing mentally ill people to work in environments which make their conditions worse would, conversely, be catastrophic.

That’s why, ultimately, I believe that Angela Rayner’s Employment Rights Bill - which seeks to improve conditions for employees - will do more to benefit the mental health of the nation than this, seemingly half-baked, idea.

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