Briefing for employers

The Duty You Already Have

Psychosocial risk across the United Kingdom, Europe and the wider world, and what changes before 2028. A seventeen page briefing by Peter J Kelly, September 2026.

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Why this briefing exists

Psychosocial risk is treated in a great many organisations as something that is coming. It is not coming. In the United Kingdom the duty to assess it has existed since 1999, and across most of Europe there is now a named legal obligation with a named method attached to it. What is missing is the point at which an employer is asked to show its working.

This briefing sets out where the law actually stands, in the United Kingdom, across Europe and in the jurisdictions that have gone furthest. It is deliberately evidenced. Every figure carries its source and its reporting year, and where something is contested or unconfirmed it says so.

It is written for the people who carry this in practice: heads of occupational health, health and safety and environment, health and wellbeing leads, and the human resources directors who end up holding it when nobody else does.

In short

The United Kingdom has a real duty to assess psychosocial risk, assembled from general provisions rather than stated in any statute that names it.

It has never once been prosecuted. The strongest enforcement action to date is a written finding of material breach against a university in December 2025, triggered by a union complaint.

Three things change before 2028: harassment duties under the Employment Rights Act 2025, a British Standard for workplace health now being drafted, and the revision of ISO 45001.

Across Europe the picture is not one market but three, and a multinational employer cannot assume that one approach satisfies all of them.

Where the duty is hardest and oldest, compliance is still a minority activity. Having the obligation does not produce the assessment.

What the briefing covers

1. The duty in the United Kingdom, and where it actually comes from
2. What the numbers say
3. Enforcement: what has actually happened
4. What changes before 2028
5. Europe is three regimes, not one market
6. The wider world is ahead of Europe
7. The gap between the duty and the practice
8. What good looks like
9. How Being Real can help

Full sources and notes are included at the end of the document.

Common questions

Is there a legal duty in the United Kingdom to assess psychosocial risk?

Yes. No statute names it, but it follows from section 2 of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 and regulation 3 of the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999, which together require every employer to assess risks to health and act on what the assessment finds. Health has been read to include mental health since Walker v Northumberland County Council.

Has any UK employer ever been prosecuted for failing to assess work-related stress?

No. The duty has existed since 1999 and it has never once been prosecuted. The strongest enforcement action to date is a written finding of material breach against a university in December 2025, triggered by a union complaint.

What changes for employers before 2028?

Three things: new harassment duties under the Employment Rights Act 2025, a British Standard for workplace health that is now being drafted, and the revision of ISO 45001, the international standard for occupational health and safety management systems.

Is ISO 45003 a legal requirement?

No. ISO 45003 is guidance on managing psychosocial risk within an ISO 45001 management system. It is not law. It is the clearest description available of what a competent approach looks like, and it is the framework Being Real assesses organisations against.

Read it, then talk to us

The most useful first step is usually a short conversation rather than a proposal. If the briefing raises a question about where your organisation sits, Peter is happy to talk it through.

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