Lauren Donnan: MATES in Construction Research Manager on the spike in suspected suicides in the sector

There’s a drive for change in the construction industry on the back of a spike in suspected suicide rates.  

In 2023, 80 construction workers died from suspected suicides - a jump from previous years. 

MATES in Construction Research Manager Lauren Donnan says mental health across the board is improving, but high workloads, job instability, and a lack of support remain key stressors.  

She says 15 to 24-year-olds and Māori workers can be particularly vulnerable.  

Donnan says we need to understand there are key pressures and groups within the industry at higher risk, where we need to target more support. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
There were eighty suspected suicides in the construction industry last year.
That is a record high. And the Mates and Construction
Industry Group, who are a charity, they want to improve
well being and reduce that number. They have released some
new research this morning which is interesting. It found that
eighty five percent of workers reported positive mental well being.

(00:21):
That's ten percent more than the year previous. Doctor Lauren
donnan is with us this morning. She's from Mates and
Constructed and conducted this research. Thank you for being with us.

Speaker 2 (00:30):
Good morning, Good morning, Thank you for having me.

Speaker 1 (00:33):
Can I start what period of time is this new
data for? Because the industry is struggling at the moment,
so I was surprised to hear that there was an
uptick in positive feelings.

Speaker 2 (00:45):
Yeah, the particular piece of research you're referring to is
between August and November of last year.

Speaker 1 (00:52):
Okay, so that might help explain some of that. What
are you putting this down to? This increase?

Speaker 2 (00:59):
Think it's really important that we do research annually so
we can understand the trends year on year and also
understand what is working well and what's not going so well,
so we can see underneath that eighty five percent.

Speaker 1 (01:15):
What does it look like and what is it telling you?

Speaker 2 (01:19):
It's telling us that year on year, overall wellbeing seems
to be improving, but that there are key groups that
are needing extra support within our industry, and those groups
have higher distress and lower mental wellbeing. And those are
workers like al Dangatahi aged fifteen to twenty four, our
non binary and female workers. And interestingly, this year we

(01:43):
looked at workers at the disability illness or mental illness
and that was a group that really needed extra support,
and one in five workers told us that they had
a disability or illness. When you think about the sides
of that group, it's over two thousand workers. I mean, yeah,
quite a sign finding for us.

Speaker 1 (02:01):
It is, it is very significant. What do you so?
Twenty twenty one there was seventy percent reported you know,
positive mental wellbeing. Twenty twenty two that was seventy five percent,
twenty twenty three, eighty five percent. Is is it possible
that because we're talking more about it and the industry
is talking more about it, that's helping people to feel better?

Speaker 2 (02:22):
One hundred percent. I think what we're seeing and what
our staff who are out on the ground every day
talking to workers. Is that shift in the culture on
sites and being able to talk about mental health, that
really early intervention stuff that we're doing where we get
in there and we make sure that work is still

(02:44):
comfortable having those courageous conversations, and I think that raised
awareness around mental wellbeing is really helping.

Speaker 1 (02:52):
Thank you so much for your time. Really interesting research,
as I said, that's come out this morning. Doctor Lauren
Donnan with us from Mates and Construction. She's the research
manager there.

Speaker 2 (03:00):
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