While just a quarter (24 per cent) of Canadian small- and medium-sized employers say they’ve seen an increase in employee absences due to mental-health issues over the last 12 months, eight in 10 (80 per cent) say they aren’t confident that employees would disclose mental-health issues, according to a new survey by Peninsula Canada.
The survey — which polled more than 79,000 global SMEs, including more than 12,000 Canadian employers — found while two-thirds (66 per cent) of Canadian SMEs don’t currently offer mental-health leave, they were more likely to offer them in comparison to their counterparts in the U.K. (85 per cent), Ireland (83 per cent), New Zealand (73 per cent) and Australia (72 per cent).
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Only one in 10 (14 per cent) Canadian SMEs said they offer mental-health training to managers or employees and just one per cent said they have mental-health first-aiders in the workplace, compared to one in eight globally. However, around one in 10 global SMEs said they plan to introduce mental-health first-aiders within the next 12 months.
Notably, one in six Canadian SME owners and managers said they’ve experienced mental-health issues in the last 12 months. While a quarter (23 per cent) said they have an employee assistance program in place, only two per cent of employers who have experienced mental-health issues over the last 12 months have sought support from it.
“There is still work to be done to ensure that global workplaces are healthy and happy, both physically and mentally, but it’s clear that progress is being made,” said Raj Singh, chief executive officer at Peninsula Canada, in a press release. “The willingness of people to speak about mental-health concerns and a change in workplace attitude towards them are major steps in the right direction.”
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