Skip to content
Adopted text

Psychosocial risks, stress and mental health at work

TA-10-2026-0326 · P10_TA(2026)0326 · PE784.330

Official HTML ↗ PDF DOCX
✦ In shortFull text
✦ In short · AI summary of this text, generated 7 Oct 2026

Written by a language model from the full text only; every figure comes from the text. The paragraph links open the paragraph a statement rests on — check the text itself before relying on it.

Parliament's resolution asks the Commission to propose a law on work-related psychosocial risks, stress and mental health at work, after an impact assessment with a competitiveness and SME test. The proposal should set minimum requirements to prevent, eliminate or reduce these risks, with definitions, employer prevention duties, regular participatory risk assessments and action plans. It should cover workers in all public and private sectors, including trainees and apprentices, and give rights to a psychologically safe workplace, support services, reporting without retaliation and disconnection. It should require supported return to work, protective and preventive services, information and consultation of workers, labour inspection powers, training, monitoring and data collection. Parliament also calls for recognition of work-related psychosocial risks as occupational diseases, gender-based violence and harassment as a psychosocial risk, and a zero-tolerance approach to violence and harassment at work.

Key points

  1. Parliament asks the Commission to review and, where necessary, amend Commission Recommendation (EU) 2022/2337 so that work-related psychosocial risks are recognised as occupational diseases, including mental health issues.
  2. It calls for all forms of gender-based violence and harassment at work to be recognised as a psychosocial risk, with gender-responsive prevention, safe reporting mechanisms and victim protection under Directive 2024/1385.
  3. It recalls that rules on the burden of proof and recognition of occupational diseases fall to Member States and their social security systems, and opposes any presumption of causality requiring employers to prove a negative.
  4. It asks that the Quality Jobs Act and the updated European Pillar of Social Rights Action Plan address psychosocial risks, and that the Commission review the OSH framework, in particular Directives 89/391/EEC and 90/270/EEC.
  5. Member States should make psychosocial risk assessments mandatory, regular, participatory and documented, with a gender-sensitive and intersectional perspective, and should inform and consult workers and their representatives.
  6. Member States should promote collective bargaining and social partner capacity, and ensure continuous training on psychosocial risks for employers, managers, workers and their representatives, including in lifelong learning.
  7. Individual resilience training or wellbeing programmes cannot replace employers' legal duty to prevent psychosocial risks through proper work organisation.
  8. Member States should ratify ILO Convention No 190 and provide clear, confidential, independent and accessible procedures for harassment, violence and discrimination cases.
  9. The Commission and Member States should strengthen labour inspectorates through a Council Recommendation on EU-wide minimum standards, and the European Labour Authority's mandate should be substantially strengthened.
  10. Member States should include primary and secondary prevention in national OSH strategies, improve data collection on psychosocial risks, and ensure a balanced, voluntary approach to telework.
  11. The Commission should propose a clear definition of work-related psychosocial risks and psychosocial risk factors, with minimum standards for recognition, prevention and compensation, and tailored support for SMEs.
  12. The requested proposal should be based on Article 153(2), point (b), and Article 153(1), point (a), TFEU, address gaps in existing legislation, avoid overlapping instruments and be covered by existing budgetary allocations.

Who is affected

  • Workers in all sectors, public and private, including trainees and apprentices, who would gain prevention, assessment, reporting and return-to-work rights.
  • Employers, who would have to prevent psychosocial risks, carry out risk assessments, adopt action plans and designate preventive services.
  • Small and medium-sized enterprises, which should receive simplified tools, sectoral guidance and targeted financial or advisory assistance.
  • Member States, which should ensure mandatory risk assessments, labour inspection powers, training, data collection and social partner involvement.
  • Social partners, whose autonomy and collective bargaining role in preventing psychosocial risks is to be respected and strengthened.

Figures and deadlines

  • More than 840 000 people die every year from health conditions linked to psychosocial risks, according to the ILO.
  • Workers reporting good or very good health: 77 % in 2010, 78 % in 2015 and 80 % in 2024, per Eurofound.
  • Exposure to high work intensity rose from 27 % in 2015 to 40 % in 2021, with one in three employees affected.
  • Work-related psychosocial risks cost over one hundred billion euro annually and account for approximately 60 % of lost working days in the Union.
  • 29 % of workers report being not very well informed or not at all informed about prevention of work-related stress at their workplace.
  • One in three doctors and nurses report symptoms of depression, one in ten experience passive suicidal thoughts, one in three experience bullying or threats of violence, and one in ten report physical violence or sexual harassment.
  • Managers using algorithmic management tools flag unclear accountability (28 %), lack of explainability (27 %) and inadequate protection of employees' physical and mental health (27 %).

Legal basis: Article 225 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union; the requested proposal should rest on Article 153(2), point (b), and Article 153(1), point (a), TFEU.