The £1m stress claim: The Gap MOST Organisations haven't closed

A recent UK case saw damages approaching £1 million awarded for work-related stress—pursued not through a tribunal, but as a personal injury claim.

Reported by Personnel Today, the case involved a former employee of the Jockey Club and centred on psychiatric injury linked to the way work was managed.

While cases at this level are still relatively rare, they highlight something many organisations are underestimating - the potential legal and financial exposure where stress is foreseeable and not addressed.

There is a growing gap between what organisations think they are doing about the wellbeing of their staff —and what the law expects of them.

That gap is becoming more visible for a simple reason:
addressing stress at work is no longer a “nice-to-have” wellbeing activity. It is a matter of legal and financial risk.

And there is no legal framework for mindfulness classes, mental health first aid and awareness days which tackle the way an individual approaches their own wellbeing, but there IS for your organisational responsibilities for not causing unmanageable stress at work.

The legal framework itself hasn’t changed.

What has changed is:

• The quality of evidence linking work to psychological harm

• The willingness to pursue claims beyond tribunals

• Greater scrutiny of what employers knew and did

At the centre of this is one concept: Foreseeability

Not whether stress existed—but whether it was visible enough that the organisation should have acted.

And this is where many organisations are more exposed than they realise.

Foreseeability doesn’t require perfect knowledge. It requires reasonable awareness.

In practice, many organisations already hold that awareness through:

• Engagement surveys showing high workload, low support, or declining wellbeing

• Pulse surveys flagging pressure, burnout, or dissatisfaction

• Grievances and complaints referencing stress, workload, or management behaviour

• Sickness absence data, particularly stress-related absence

• Exit interviews highlighting unsustainable pressure or poor management

• Informal signals—teams under strain, repeated escalation, high turnover

The issue is rarely the absence of data.

It is the absence of systematic follow-through.

Without clear action, these sources move from insight to evidence of foreseeability.

In legal terms, they begin to answer the question:

What did the organisation know—or what should it reasonably have known?

This applies where:

• A mental health condition meets the definition of disability

• A failure to be seen to consider reasonable adjustments

• A claim brought through an employment tribunal

This is where many organisations focus their attention.

It’s also worth noting that many tribunal cases are settled before reaching a full hearing which can limit both financial exposure and reputational impact

As a result, while tribunals can be costly, they often don’t represent the upper end of financial risk.

and Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999

These require organisations to:

• Protect employee health, including risk assessing for stress (at the organisational level)

• Take reasonable steps to reduce those risk factors

They don’t usually lead directly to compensation claims—but the an

They define what should have been happening.

While a few enforcement notices have been issued by HSE, organisations are not typically pursued under health and safety law for stress. However, failures such as not carrying out a stress risk assessment can be used as evidence that risks were not properly managed—particularly in personal injury claims.

This is where the largest payouts are emerging - albeit it is early days but case law is now emerging.

Here, the legal test is:

• Was there a duty of care?

• Was it breached?

• Was harm reasonably foreseeable?

• Was that harm caused by the breach?

When organisations:

• Fail to act on known risks

• Ignore repeated warning signs

• Leave managers unequipped to respond

…it becomes much easier to argue that psychological harm was predictable and preventable.

And that is what drives significantly higher damages.

For those working in wellbeing, HR, or health and safety, this shift matters.

Historically, the case for investing in wellbeing has often relied on:

• Engagement

• Productivity

• Absence reduction

• It is the right thing to do….

All valid—but can be difficult to quantify for some organisations.

Higher-value stress claims—like the recent Jockey Club case—mean:

• The cost of inaction is more visible

• The link between management decisions and legal exposure is clearer

• The conversation can move from “nice to have” to risk and accountability

This creates an opportunity.

Because many of the underlying issues:

• Work design

• Leadership behaviour

• Resourcing decisions

• Organisational culture

…sit beyond the traditional reach of wellbeing initiatives which often sit at the individual level, and are often about destigmatising mental ill health, health promotions, mental health first aid and stress awareness

And for many professionals, that has been the barrier:

• Limited influence at senior level

• Difficulty challenging how work is designed

• A lack of language that connects wellbeing to risk

This shift provides that language.

Many organisations are still focusing on:

• Awareness campaigns

• Wellbeing initiatives

• Employee benefits

These may support individuals.

But they do not demonstrate that:

• Risks have been identified

• Causes have been addressed

• Preventative controls are in place

And that is what the law examines

.

If foreseeability is the issue, then the response needs to focus on structured prevention.

This is the foundation.

A robust organisational stress (psychosocial) risk assessment:

• Brings together existing data (surveys, absence, grievances) and/or gains new insight through employee forums.

• Identifies root causes (workload, role clarity, management behaviour, culture)

• Prioritises action

It turns scattered insight into clear, defensible risk management.

This is the work I do with organisations—helping them identify what is actually driving stress and turning that into practical, prioritised action. It is what I am right in the thick of at the moment with Eurotunnel - and it has been a brilliant exercise.

Managers are often where foreseeability becomes visible.

They are the ones who:

• Hear concerns

• See changes in behaviour

• Manage workload day to day

Without the capability to:

• Recognise risk

• Respond effectively

• Adjust or escalate

…organisations lose a critical line of defence.

Stress risk is rarely about individual resilience.

It is shaped by:

• Work design

• Resourcing

• Performance expectations

• Cultural norms

Unless these are addressed, risk remains embedded.

Understanding the problem is only the starting point.

Organisations then need to:

• Identify quick wins

• Tackle more complex systemic issues

• Embed sustainable changes in how work is designed and managed

That translation—from insight to action—is where many get stuck.

Many organisations are asking:

“What are we offering in terms of wellbeing?”

The more relevant question is:

“Where is harm foreseeable—and what are we doing about it?”

High-value stress claims are not being driven by new law.

They are being driven by a growing mismatch between:

• What organisations already know

• And what they do with that knowledge

The recent case reported by Personnel Today is a clear reminder of what’s at stake when that gap isn’t addressed.

Closing it requires a shift:
From awareness to assessment
From initiatives to intervention
From support to prevention

For organisations—and the professionals within them—that shift is now both a legal necessity and a strategic opportunity.