Member Article

Housebuilders pledge support for World Mental Health Day

Staff from five star housebuilders Barratt Homes and David Wilson Homes in South Wales have pledged their support for World Mental Health Day (October 10) with a day of fundraising.

The housebuilders have chosen Mind Cymru as their charity of the year and will be holding a Wear a Hat day at their Cardiff offices and on development sites throughout South Wales.

“Mind Cymru campaigns to improve the mental health of everyone in Wales and we are committed to raising money throughout the year and are kicking off our support with a Wear a Hat day,” said managing director Steve Williams.

“We are encouraging all of our members of staff to don a hat to focus our minds on World Mental Health Day. We know that mental health problems can affect anyone but October 10 is a great day for everyone to show their support for better mental health and we’ll be inviting staff and visitors to wear a hat in support.”

The housebuilders also support a new campaign within the construction industry to provide support for workers suffering mental health problems.

This scheme is run by the House Builders Federation together with Lighthouse Construction Industry Charity – together they aim to provide house builders with key resources and training to support employees and sub-contractors. “A construction worker is now 10 times more likely to die through suicide than a fall from a height and the industry is now higher than agriculture when it comes to mental health issues and rates of suicide,” said Steve. “As an industry a huge amount of focus has been on how we ensure sites are as safe physically as they can be. However, we also need to be doing all we can to address the mental health issues that we face and improve the unacceptable level of suicide among construction workers.”

Barratt Homes and David Wilson Homes have pledged to adopt the ‘Building Mental Health Framework’, which gives best practice guidance to companies to help put critical steps in place.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Barratt Homes .