When are employers responsible for workplace stress? Michelle Marnham investigates
Two recent cases examined the issue of when an employer is considered to be in breach of its duty to take reasonable care in relation to injury caused by stress at work. The first is Hiles v South Gloucestershire NHS Primary Care Trust [2006] EWHC 3418 (QB), [2007] All ER (D) 132 (Jan) in which Robert Moxon Browne QC—after considering the seminal decisions of Hatton v Sutherland [2002] EWCA Civ 76, [2002] All ER 1 and the House of Lords in Barber v Somerset County Council [2004] UKHL 13, [2004] 2 All ER 385—found that the employer was in breach of its duty to Tina Hiles in respect of the psychiatric breakdown she suffered as a result of stress at work.
Hiles was employed by the defendant as a health visitor with responsibility for children. When she commenced employment she was told by her then manager that her workload should not exceed responsibility for 200 children. A new manager was sub-sequently appointed and Hiles’s workload increased to responsibility for 230–240 children. At a performance
