In its first - and very significant - ruling on workplace stress, the House of Lords has put the onus back on employers to take responsibility for the health and well-being of their staff. In Barber v Somerset County Council (IDS Brief 756 and see LELR 89 for a summary), their Lordships said that the council was in breach of its duty of care to Mr Barber by failing to make inquiries about his health.

What was the history to the case?

Following a restructuring because of falling pupil numbers at the school where he had been head of maths, Mr Barber took on extra responsibilities which made his job very stressful. He had a mental breakdown and took early retirement at the end of March 1997. He was 52. He successfully sued his employer in the county court, and was awarded general and special damages of just over £101,000.

However, the county council appealed to the Court of Appeal which heard the case together with three other similar cases in a composite judgment reported as Hatton v Sutherland. It decided that the county council had not been in breach of its duty of care.

What happened to Mr Barber?

Their Lordships agreed that it was crucial to ascertain what the school knew about Mr Barber's state of health in order to decide its liability. They noted that he had begun to 'feel the strain' towards the end of 1995, which got worse during the spring term of 1996.

In May 1996, he was signed off work, suffering from stress and depression. When he returned to work, nothing much had changed. No one approached him to talk about his illness, so he arranged a meeting with the headteacher. She was very unsympathetic, however, telling him that all the staff were under stress.

Mr Barber subsequently had separate meetings with the two deputy heads towards the end of the summer term, but neither of them took any steps to resolve the situation, although he had said he could not remain in post if the work pressures did not improve. 
By the beginning of the autumn term, Mr Barber found himself with the same or possibly even heavier workload. He wrote to his doctor asking for counselling, but before that could be arranged Mr Barber had a crisis at school and started shaking a pupil. He left that day and never returned. He was subsequently diagnosed as suffering from moderate or severe depression.

What did the House of Lords decide?

Basically, the House of Lords thought that although the school was not guilty of a flagrant breach of its duty of care to Mr Barber, there was not enough evidence to set aside the decision of the county court judge. Their Lordships decided that the employer's duty to take action arose in June and July 1996, when Mr Barber saw each member of the school's senior management team separately.

They said the team should have made inquiries about his problems and seen what they could do to ease them, in consultation with officials at the county council's education department. Instead the school just brushed off his concerns, or told him to prioritise his work.

The House of Lords did not accept that there was nothing the senior management team could do for Mr Barber, despite the severity of the problems it was facing as a whole. Had they reduced his workload and made him feel that they were on his side, it might have made a real difference. In any event Mr Barber's condition should have been monitored and, if there was no improvement more drastic action taken.

Supply teachers cost money, but not as much as the cost of the permanent loss through psychiatric illness of a valued member of the school staff. Mr Barber's appeal was therefore allowed.