COUNCIL workers missed more than 24,000 days work through stress in the past year, The Argus can reveal.

In total, 150,000 of days were lost through sickness throughout the public sector in the county in 2016/17.

Scores of council staff have been forced to leave their roles in the years of austerity because of stress although the real figure is much higher as many councils do not keep an easily accessible record.

More than half of the ten councils in Sussex who responded to The Argus saw a rise in the number of working days lost through stress compared to five years ago - a period in which most have seen significant reductions in staff numbers.

Brighton and Hove City Council, which concedes it still has an issue with staff absence, recorded almost three times as many stress-related absences last year as West Sussex County Council.

The city council’s workers took an average of 10.6 sick days in 2016/17 – the highest of any of the county’s councils.

In the Brighton and Hove City Council’s adult social care teams, staff missed 13 days last year with sickness on average. Unions said increased contact with clients meant staff were more liable to contract

East Sussex County Council had the highest number of staff quitting their jobs because of stress - 27 members of staff leaving in 2015/16 alone.

Unison convenor Diana Leach said disruption at Brighton and Hove City Council had contributed to rising stress levels

She said: “There’s certainly been a lot of changes to policies and practices. There has been huge staff turnover in some departments and maybe other authorities like county councils have not been through as serious an overhaul.”

An East Sussex County Council spokesman said: “Despite the challenges we all face as a result of increased pressures on council budgets, we’ve seen a significant decrease in working days lost to stress.

“We’re committed to doing whatever we can to ensure stress-related absence is picked up and addressed at the earliest possible opportunity.”

The authority said it had brought in extra training for managers, more detailed return to work forms, offered initiatives aimed at improving staff health and wellbeing, including mindfulness courses, resilience training and free health checks.

A Brighton and Hove City Council spokeswoman said: “The latest Staff Survey showed that our work force feel that there have been significant improvements in how valued staff feel by the organisation and in the support they receive from line managers.

“Whilst we have seen some reduction in sickness over the last 18 months the council is clear that it must not rest on its laurels, and must do more, especially as it continues to respond to the impact of budget reductions.”

She added the council had a number of new plans to look after its work force including a new approach to promoting staff wellbeing, using information from the survey to target areas that are under pressure, and making managers more accountable for their performance, including in relation to feedback from staff on performance.

UNIONS TELL STAFF TO IGNORE NEW SCHEME TO CUT SICKNESS

UNIONS are advising members not to comply with a new system brought in by council bosses to lower sickness absences.

Unison has told Brighton and Hove City Council staff not to play ball with the First Care scheme, which encourages staff to ring in sick to an outside contractor.

Finance director David Kuenssberg had outlined the scheme as one of the ways the council had hoped to lower staff absence.

He said the poor sickness record was putting a strain on capacity with the council’s level of absence above the level of similar cities. He suggested the city’s general poor mental health record and higher proportion of stress and anxiety might be a factor in why council staff missed more days of work.

Under the new arrangement, the council is requesting employees contact FirstCare staff rather than their own managers who will then try to manage their return to work.

Union convenor Diana Leach said: “Unison is completely opposed to FirstCare. We don’t believe it will solve anything. Staff have to report to a third party which upsets the relationship staff have with their management in explaining their absence, instead sharing private and confidential information with an outside contractor.

“We think there are other ways to lower stress, one would be dealing with management bullying and harassment which is quite high.”

A council spokeswoman said: “These measures are consistent with good practice.”