Concerns have been raised over the levels of Southampton City Council staff who are off sick for mental health reasons.

Figures from the local authority showed that in the past 12 months there had been more than 27,500 sick days.

More than half of these, around 14,000, had been logged as psychological absence, including anxiety, depression and stress.

Members of the council’s governance committee questioned head of HR Chris Bishop about the situation.

Labour councillor for Bevois ward Mike Denness said: “We’re a long way now post-Covid.

“There is a lot more flexible working in places now but we’re still clocking up 27,500 sick days a year, which is a frightening amount, particularly when you take on board the number of long-term sick and short-term sick.

“Most of them are related to stress, psychological, mental health-related issues.”

Conservative councillor for Harefield ward Rob Harwood asked what was being done to support staff.

Mr Bishop said there was now a specific officer leading on wellbeing at a corporate level, with them splitting their time between this area and their role overseeing diversity and inclusion.

He said the council was successfully running menopause cafes and there were now dedicated pages on internal websites about wellbeing, diversity and inclusion, which contained links to information and support.

Cllr Denness said: “I would suggest that we are clearly not doing enough because we have still got that many people going sick. The number is increasing in terms of we are above the sector average at the moment.”

He added: “Is there more we can do? Are there other things that other local authorities are doing that we could do?

“You can have all the wellbeing walks that you want, but if people are genuinely disillusioned with being at work, unhappy with work.

“I’m not saying it’s just here, local authorities all around the country. Working for a local authority is a difficult place to work, wherever you are in the organisation.”

Mr Bishop said the council did learn from others and there was more they could do but added that capacity was always going to be a challenge.

Referencing the council’s current financial plight and uncertainty around jobs, Mr Bishop said: “In this changing time that’s not helping as people are obviously anxious about ‘what my job might be’.

“We’re all talking about transformation and things happening, so that is causing anxiety to go up in my own team and other areas I’m sure.

“We’re trying to get management to think about all those dynamics when they are managing their teams.

“We are looking at other ideas and how we can bring that impact in.”