Spain: Report on insecure employment and mental health

The Minister of Employment, Yolanda Díaz, has presented a report on insecure employment and mental health. She stresses that this report “also sends a message, loud and clear, that mental health is linked to inequality and reminds us that the impact on mental health is more than twice as acute among workers in the least secure jobs, and that the worst situation is to be seen among women, immigrants and young people”. The committee that wrote the report advocates conditions that will provide better protection, health and care for workers, and the introduction of a “mental health system that is universal, fair, free to use, human and of high quality” (see press release). The experts emphasise that the informal economy, precarious employment, decentralised forms of organisation of production, and underestimating the need to look after employees are some of the causes of the deterioration in mental health, but they also emphasis that, even where employees are on stable contracts, the issues of digital disconnection, overtime and unpredictable working hours all have a negative impact.