National Suicide Prevention Standard

Liz Twist Excerpts

Tuesday 14th April 2026 Westminster Hall

[Graham Stringer (in the Chair)]

I remind hon. Members that they may make a speech only with the prior permission of the Member in charge and the Minister. I have received no information that such permission has been given. As is the convention for 30-minute debates, there will not be an opportunity for the Member in charge to wind up.

[Liz Twist (Blaydon and Consett) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered Government support for businesses implementing National Suicide Prevention Standard BS 30480.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Stringer. This debate is about a risk we often overlook in our workplaces, but which can have a great impact on families, work colleagues and a much wider group of people. We have rigorous standards for fire safety and electrical wiring, and for hard hats on construction sites. We accept those as the cost of doing business safely yet, until now, we have had no such road map for the most complex safety risk of all: the mental health and lives of our employees.

Research shows that one in four adults has contemplated suicide, and one in 13 has attempted it. For every suicide death, at least 135 people, including colleagues, clients and communities alike, are directly or indirectly affected. Suicide is the leading cause of death for men under the age of 50. According to the Office for National Statistics, it was the leading cause of death for males and females aged 20 to 34 in the UK for all years observed, accounting for 27.1% of male deaths.

Suicide touches nearly every workplace, yet most organisations lack the tools to address the emotional aftermath.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

First of all, I commend the hon. Lady for introducing the debate; this is a massive issue, absolutely. Does she not agree that, as 90% of businesses are small businesses with no human resources department, it is difficult for employers to be aware of the help for staff, and to be trained? Further, does the hon. Lady not agree that the Government, and particularly the Minister, need to ensure that accessible training is of no or minimal cost to small businesses? The very thing that the hon. Lady wants to happen can happen, but it needs that wee bit of help.

[Liz Twist]

Of course small and medium-sized enterprises are in a difficult position without large resources, but there are lots of things we can do. As the hon. Member suggests, I will ask the Minister what we can do to ensure that SMEs also have the ability to take part in this training.

[Alex Easton (North Down) (Ind)]

Does the hon. Member agree that BS 30480 will make a real difference only if businesses are actively supported in implementing it, rather than simply being left with a “do your best” approach? In that context, would she support formal a Government endorsement of the standard, including through health and safety guidance on work-related stress and psychological risk?

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[Liz Twist]

Indeed, I will be pushing the Government to do all they can to support the implementation of the standard, and to recognise those psychological risks.

As we know, male-dominated industries such as construction face severe historical challenges with work and mental health. Agriculture and farming workers face extreme social isolation and financial pressures, and have access to lethal means. Healthcare workers and emergency responders experience severe trauma alongside having ready access to pharmaceuticals.

The economic impact of suicide is clear. In the UK, it is estimated at nearly £1.46 million per death. Nationally, this costs the UK economy nearly £10 billion per year, factoring in the cost of lost productivity, healthcare and emergency services. Suicide has a profound effect on every workplace it touches, whether through the loss of a colleague, supporting someone in crisis or managing the complex emotional and operational aftermath. Yet organisations are not necessarily equipped to address this issue openly and effectively. For employees without proper support, the trauma and grief of exposure to suicide significantly damages workplace attendance, retention, performance and productivity. Colleagues often experience profound feelings of guilt, inadequacy and confusion.

Because people fear saying the wrong thing, they often do or say nothing, which leads to further distress and emotional toll. This standard, informed by research, data and lived experience, aims to provide organisations with practical, evidence-based recommendations to help plan for, respond to and support people affected by suicide, or those with thoughts of suicide, in the workplace and beyond. The standard is designed to help workplaces support people who might be on the frontline of dealing with the stresses and strains of life.

[Robbie Moore (Keighley and Ilkley) (Con)]

I commend the hon. Member for her work in chairing the all-party parliamentary group on suicide and self-harm prevention. I also thank her for jointly organising an event in Parliament to which constituents of mine, Anna Scott and Roger Cunliffe, who lost their daughter to suicide, brought the Yorkshire Speak Their Name quilts; we had 19 quilts on display here in the Houses of Parliament.

Will the hon. Member recognise, however, that those in our farming community, working in isolated environments, are of particular concern, with men in farming being twice as likely to lose their lives to suicide as the average man working in any other environment? Will she join me in celebrating the work of the Farming Community Network and others, which do so much to support those working in isolated environments, particularly in the farming community?

[Liz Twist]

I thank the hon. Member for that question. I had great pleasure in working with his constituents on the quilt exhibition in the Upper Waiting Hall; it was a tremendous experience, and they do tremendous work. Farming is indeed one of the industries most affected by these circumstances. I certainly commend the work being done on the agricultural side, by organisations such as Yellow Wellies, to ensure that those issues are addressed.

[Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

I really appreciate all the work that my hon. Friend does in this area. I was very moved when a constituent, a police officer, came to me to share the experiences from his force when somebody took their life. The force did not have the tools available to support him, leading to his own mental health challenges, and to those of his colleagues. Therefore, it is really important, as part of this standard, that employers are equipped to identify those pressures—often overwork and stress, or bullying at work and the culture set in the workplace—and to then address the challenges that people face with trauma. Does my hon. Friend agree that we need that holistic approach to people’s wellbeing at work?

[Liz Twist]

I thank my hon. Friend for that question. Certainly I agree that we must do all that we can. I hope that, in this debate today, we will be able to take steps forward to implement the standard.

I want briefly to touch on the work that the British Standards Institution does. It plays a vital role in workplace standards of all kinds in this country. The BSI is 125 years old this year. I am sure the Minister will join me in congratulating the BSI on that achievement, and the enormous contribution it has made to businesses and the everyday life of people throughout the United Kingdom since 1901.

British standards have helped with everything from saving lives with medical devices to air raid shelters during the war, crash helmets and now addressing suicide. I thank colleagues from the BSI for being here in the Public Gallery today to raise awareness of their organisation’s hard work, particularly on the new standard BS 30480: “Suicide and the Workplace”. I know that the BSI has a positive impact on society through its work. As chair of the APPG on suicide and self-harm prevention, I am pleased to have supported work on that standard. I am also delighted that the House has endorsed the standard and is seeking to adopt it following internal consultation.

The publication of the world’s first standard on suicide and the workplace represents a significant milestone in supporting mental health and wellbeing at work across the UK and beyond. The BSI, acting as convenor, brought together many leading individuals and organisations to develop it. The standard itself calls for assigning a named senior leader to take responsibility for the organisation’s suicide prevention strategy and provide targeted training so that line managers are confident in spotting warning signs.

[Lee Pitcher (Doncaster East and the Isle of Axholme) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend is a true champion for mental health and has been quite an inspiration to me since I have been in Parliament. The standard is an amazing step forward for mental health in the workplace and is hugely welcome. It will save lives and help people in their everyday lives who experience suicide happening around them. Does my hon. Friend agree that we need to be proactive and open up channels of communication really early to prevent suicide? We should encourage things such as mental first aid training in the workplace, which is really important.

[Liz Twist]

I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend. Indeed, the whole purpose of this debate is to encourage us to be proactive and work with other organisations and employers to ensure that the standard is implemented and lives are saved.

Additionally, the standard encourages businesses to collaborate with workers to help design individual safety plans that outline coping strategies and emergency contacts at times when they need help or support. I was glad to work with the BSI on the standard. It represents the outcome of a huge amount of work involving employers, and mental health and suicide prevention organisations such as Samaritans, trade unions and BSI staff, some of whom are in the Public Gallery today. I was especially pleased that Mr Speaker granted permission to help launch BS 30480 in Speaker’s House last November.

I pay tribute to Professor Ann John, director of the National Centre for Suicide Prevention, who chaired the BSI committee, and within that, Marcus Long, who led the communications group, and Peter Kelly, who led the drafting panel. I also thank the BSI staff I have worked with over the past few months—Jane Packer, Lachean Humphreys and Robert Jervis-Gibbons—for their leadership on the standard. It has been a great pleasure working with all of them, but now we have to make sure that the standard is rolled out by employers. There has been a great deal of enthusiasm from employers to date, with 11,500 downloads of the standard so far.

How can the Government promote the standard? I believe the standard will help many workplaces across the UK, and I am sure the Government will work with me and the BSI to promote it to businesses. For example, Heathrow airport has publicly spoken about its adoption of the standard, and so has the Inclusion Education, in a recent BSI webinar in which I took part. Can we please encourage more to follow their lead? I believe we need the Government’s help to do this.

As we have heard, the standard offers clear guidance for organisations of all sizes and sectors, including public bodies, charities, social enterprises, businesses and commercial enterprises. I hope the Government can actively promote it, especially within high-risk, male-dominated industries, by leveraging their new and existing partnerships, such as the upcoming three-year collaboration with the Premier League, aimed at improving men’s health, literacy and suicide prevention. Furthermore, the Department of Health and Social Care could work with the Health and Safety Executive to ensure that workplace first aid and safety guidance emphasises the importance of managing risks to mental health using the standard. I am pleased the Government mentioned the standard in the men’s health strategy earlier this year, and that was significant. That is a good starting point for ensuring that employers start to implement the standard. The focus of today’s debate is how the Government can help with that task and help BS 30480 contribute to the national suicide prevention strategy.

April is Stress Awareness Month in workplaces, and I hope the Minister will agree to some actions today, maybe on behalf of his colleagues in the Department for Business and Trade. First, will his Department help to promote this important standard with business, public sector bodies and throughout Government? Secondly, will he commit to jointly organising and attending a roundtable with me, the BSI, the Department for Business and Trade, key UK businesses, SMEs and the unions to discuss the roll-out of the standard across UK workplaces. Thirdly, will he say how the Government will ensure that small and medium-sized enterprises can access the trauma-informed training required to implement the standard effectively?

We want to ensure that the standard not only raises awareness, but gives organisations the tools they need to reduce risk, intervene effectively and encourage conversations, breaking down the myths and the stigma that talking about suicide causes people to feel. With help from the Government and colleagues in this place, we can all work together to achieve our ambition of seeing fewer people die by suicide.

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[Liz Twist]

Can I tempt the Minister to go a little further? I specifically requested a roundtable to encourage take up of the standard. Is something that he can look at and mention to the other parties I discussed?

[Dr Ahmed]

My hon. Friend is trying to steal the conclusion of my speech, so I will bring it forward. I am always delighted to meet her, and she knows I am happy to contribute to any roundtable that she feels needs my attendance. I can charge my officials with the task of getting that organised.

Those community-based mental health centres are co-delivered with primary care specialist services that can be drawn on as required. People can receive psychological therapies, medication and other interventions, while also having access to expertise that can help with wider issues that may be impacting on their wellbeing and recovery, such as issues with housing, employment and peer support.

Our suicide prevention support pathfinder programme for middle-aged men will invest up to £3.6 million over three years in areas of England where middle-aged men face the greatest risk of suicide. It will support new ways of embedding effective, tailored support for middle-aged men within their communities and will create clearer, more joined-up pathways into existing local suicide prevention systems.

Today’s discussion has without doubt highlighted that suicide prevention truly is everybody’s business. Every person, organisation and service has a role to play. We can all do more to ensure that we are equipped with the skills that can and will save lives. Our suicide prevention strategy sets out a comprehensive, evidence-driven plan to reduce the number of lives lost to suicide across our country. It highlights the important role that employers and organisations can and should play in supporting their staff to get the support they need. Guidance such as the BSI’s “Suicide and the Workplace” standard brings welcome visibility to just how important that role is. I extend my thanks to everyone who contributed to and was involved in the development of the standard.

In conclusion, I know how personally painful debates such as this can be, but all hon. Members will know that the impact of these discussions goes well beyond the four walls of our Parliament and into the streets. That awareness is so important, and I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Blaydon and Consett for securing this debate. I would be delighted to meet her and to organise the meetings I outlined.

Question put and agreed to.