Mental health on site toolbox talk

The point

Most talks are about kit, or a hazard you can see. This one is about how you're doing. One in four of us will have a problem with our mental health at some point - that's HSE's figure, which means it's normal, not rare, and most people come through it. On this site, saying you're struggling gets treated the same as saying your back's gone. You say it, we sort what we can, and nobody thinks less of you. That's the whole point of the next five minutes.

The hazard, in plain terms

Pressure is part of the trade - programme, weather, money, travel, long stints away from home. Pressure is fine until it's more than you can carry. HSE puts it plainly: stress is not an illness, but it can make you ill. And it doesn't stay at the gate. Trouble at home walks in with you, and the job stacks on top.

The hazard here isn't a machine - it's silence. We're good at cracking on and bad at saying anything. So watch for change. A mate gone quiet or withdrawn. Shorter-tempered than usual. Turning up late, taking more days off, edgy, off their game, not themselves. You'll spot that long before any form does, because you know them.

What to do

• If you're struggling, say so - to me, to the site supervisor, to anyone here you trust. Today, not when it's worse.
• Keep an eye on your mates. If someone's not themselves, ask them straight: "You all right? You don't seem it." Ask twice - the first answer is usually "fine".
• Listen. You don't need answers and you're not their doctor. Hearing them out is the job.
• If it's the work loading someone up - hours, a deadline, a run-in - bring it to me. If work is the cause, work can change.
• See your GP if it's hanging over you week after week. That's what they're there for, same as a knee that won't mend.
• Put Samaritans in your phone before you walk off: 116 123. Free to call, any hour, every day of the year. You don't have to be at rock bottom to ring it.

What to never do

• Never take the mick out of someone who speaks up. One laugh at the wrong moment and nobody on this site says another word.
• Never sit on a worry about a mate. Better to ask and be wrong than stay quiet and be right.
• Never pass on what someone tells you as site chat. It stops with you, or it comes to me - nowhere else.

Questions to ask the crowd

The talk ends in a conversation. These are the ones that start it.

• Think of someone on a past job who wasn't themselves - no names. What was the first change you noticed?
• If you were having a rough time, what would stop you saying so on this site, and what would make it easier?
• What's on this job right now - hours, travel, deadlines - that's piling weight on people more than it should?