Construction firms across Great Britain can now access broad training and resources focused on suicide prevention and mental health awareness to support colleagues working within the construction industry.

Statistics from Scottish Action for Mental Health (SAMH) concerningly show that construction workers are four times more likely to take their own life because of struggles with mental health.

Aiming to make a difference and prevent further loss of life within our industry, Barratt and David Wilson Homes and SAMH, have developed a new accessible programme to help fight against mental health challenges.

The project called ‘Suicide Prevention in Construction Training,’ has been made possible through £239,000 of funding awarded by CITB’s Industry Impact Fund (IIF). Seeing the idea have potential to deliver real, lasting change, we ensured the right support was in place to help secure the funding to develop the programme.

The initiative is being delivered by the SAMH training platform, ensuring both companies and individuals are equipped with the tools and resources needed to support and identify colleagues who could be struggling with mental health challenges.

During the development phase, the programme demonstrated clear benefits, with participating organisations reporting increased awareness of mental health issues and suicide prevention.

Kevin Urquhart, Construction Director at Barrett and David Wilson Homes mentioned that from discussions he had, more individuals also felt able to open up, seek help and engage in conversations about their mental wellbeing.

All involved in the project believe this to be an important step towards breaking down the long-standing stigma around this issue across the industry.

Speaking about the initiative’s launch Kevin said:

“We can all say that we want to progress things, but without funding and without the support of someone like CITB within the industry, I don't think the project would have got off the ground.”

“I've said it always from day one, if we save one life and we save one person, then you can't put a price tag on someone's life. So, we've done what we needed to do, and we are going to change the industry,” added Kevin.

Nicole Burke, Workplace Business Development Manager at SAMH who heard about CITB’s Industry Impact Fund through Kevin said:

“For me the most valuable support we had from CITB was the revision of our application.

“There were stages of our application that we had to change to make sure that the funding would be successful and CITB were extremely supportive.”

“As it’s no longer a project in development, we are really excited to now have it out in the world,” Nicole added.

Find out more about CITB’s Industry Impact Fund here.