News

Turning to Mental Health

MVIS and Bartco UK have always taken mental health very seriously. Poor mental health is one of the biggest causes of death in the construction and highways industries and in 2020, the Chartered Institute of Building (CIOB) published a report that showed 26% of respondents had considered taking their own lives in the previous year. The report also showed that high percentages of respondents suffered with issues such as depression, stress, anxiety and fatigue.

National statistics shed more light on the issue. From around the 5000 suicides in the UK every year related to mental health issues, males account for three-quarters of the total figure, making this the biggest killer of men up to the age of 49 in the UK.

But this is not a new problem for the industry or indeed for wider society.

For many years now, MVIS and Bartco UK have placed mental health as a major priority, working on developing our team to ensure that everyone is ALGEE trained, that everyone has access to a mental health first aider and one of our more recent developments is providing our team with access to the Employee Assistance Programme (EAP), an anonymous advice and support service offered by Peninsula.

Amongst our mental health first aiders has traditionally been Bartco UK’s Purchasing & Stock Control Supervisor, Rebecca Prince and the UK Group Commercial and Operations Director for both MVIS and Bartco UK, Anne Ashman.

However, we are now proud to announce that Jon Larkins, North Delivery Supervisor has been qualified as the group’s first male mental health first aider. Jon is an ideal member of the team to take on this responsibility, working for MVIS and closely with the Bartco UK team, he will be able to offer his support to everyone who works for the group in addition to the comfort he can bring to male team members who may feel more comfortable discussing mental health issues with another male. 

Jon comments, “It’s great to be able to lend a helping hand with my training.  Mental health awareness has never been so widespread but there’s still a lot of work to be done both within business and as a society. It’s so vital that we all take mental health seriously.”

Anne adds, “Jon is a great addition to the mental health first aider team. He is well liked within the group and is naturally a very good listener. His training in mental first aid will only channel this and put his compassionate nature to fantastic use.”