Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps his Department has taken to engage with the (a) financial services, (b) legal, (c) accountancy and (d) other professional services organisations in relation to mental health issues, at all levels of relevant organisations.

Sir Charlie Mayfield’s independent Keep Britain Working review report, published on 5 November 2025, highlighted the scale of the problem of people falling out of work for reasons of ill-health and disability, including mental health, and the vital role employers can play in addressing this.

The review proposed three areas for reform over the next 3 years. These were:

• The development of good practice and outcomes for creating thriving, healthy workplaces, to be developed into a robust, recognised standard.

• Creating effective, employer-facing Workplace Health Provision.

• Driving adoption through evidence and incentives.

Alongside these reforms the review also called for the launch of a “Vanguard phase” to work with volunteer employers, providers and regions of the UK to develop and test the ideas and initiatives in the review, proving what works and building the evidence to support scaling towards general adoption. The Vanguard consists of a range of forward-thinking employers across different sizes, sectors and services, including legal, insurance, financial, and accountancy.

We are working with the Vanguard to test and refine what works best for helping people with long-term health conditions and disabilities, including mental health conditions, get the support they need to stay in work. This will be developed over the course of this year into an employer facing standard working in partnership with the British Standards Institution.

As per the recommendations of the review, the Vanguard phase also includes deep dives into key issues, one of which is addressing mental health at work. We’re working with employers and health services to improve support for people with mental health conditions, including better training, early intervention, and more flexible workplace practices.

The DWPs’ Strategic Relationship Team (SRT) works with employers across a wide range of sectors to promote workplace health and wellbeing and raise awareness of the support available to employees experiencing mental health conditions. This includes promoting services such as Access to Work and Able Futures, providing guidance to employers and encouraging good practice on disability inclusion, workplace adjustments and the retention of employees with health conditions.

In addition, DWP regularly engages with employers to increase understanding of the support available to people with health conditions and disabilities, which includes promoting the Disability Confident scheme, to encourage inclusive recruitment practices and help employers to better support disabled people and those with health conditions throughout the recruitment process and in employment.