Force ranks second highest mental health leave among officers
2 September 2025
The Force has the second highest number of officers placed on mental health leave, new statistics have revealed.
A Freedom of Information request published by Police Oracle revealed 1,162 WMP officers were signed off work due to stress, anxiety, depression or post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) between April 2024 and April 2025.
This number is the Force’s largest since 2018-19 and accounted for roughly 6.5 per cent of the report’s national total (including Scotland) of 17,152 – itself representing an overall increase for the fourth year in a row.
Patrick McBrearty, West Midlands Police Federation’s health and safety lead, immediately pointed towards the conditions faced by officers – particularly those on the frontline – as the main driver of mental health-related sign-offs.
“From what I hear from our members, it’s certainly not getting any easier out there, so you can’t expect the figures to go down. Sadly, I’m not surprised in the slightest,” he said.
“For me, if you’re looking for the biggest cause of mental health difficulties for officers, you don’t need to look beyond what they’re dealing with on the job every single day.
“And I’m not just talking about the distressing incidents themselves, but the actual workplace environment – there are simply not enough staff to respond to the Force’s level of demand.
“We know this is true because of the time constraints placed on officers. Many of our members say breaks aren’t the norm, but merely a bonus if they get the chance, and I think that sadly encapsulates the issue.”
Intelligence
Patrick added his belief that it is this risk of burn-out which can be so mentally damaging to officers – many of whom he says have a sense of pride in completing their work at all costs which may be taken advantage of.
To fix this, he argued more emotional intelligence from managers and supervisors needed to be ingrained into the Force.
“I don’t think we should accept being so high in this report just because we are one of the biggest forces,” he continued.
“As a Force, we have to react to the changing profile of officers in the Force. We now have a high percentage of young in service officers, some of whom are ill-equipped to deal with the high levels of trauma and emotion they face in policing.
“Before anything else, we need to be people first, always striving to be empathetic.
Stretched
“This links into the other very clear, simple solution – funding, which I think is currently skewed. We get comparatively less for dealing with a higher population of people, and I fear we are being stretched beyond ‘big enough to cope’.”
Meanwhile, a factor external to the Force discussed by Patrick was policing increasingly becoming what he described as the ‘everything emergency service’, referring to the expectations around helping the public in jobs previously dealt with by the likes of social services and local authorities.
Turning his attention to more solutions for officers’ mental fatigue, he argued many incident aftercare options within the Force could be improved and signposted better.
He was more optimistic, however, about support in place around prevention, rather than cure.
“Something I would encourage our members to do is to properly complete a stress risk assessment and make sure it is properly responded to by your supervisor. Also, always log anything relevant on the near-misses system, which is on the Force’s e-safety platform.
Struggling
“These two actions will create a body of evidence of your experiences at work which, ideally, will be taken on board before you end up struggling to cope.
“Beyond that, please know that if all else fails, the Federation will always be here for you. Of course, we will support you if you need time away from work, but ideally, we want to help you before you’re in a position where you’re suffering mentally.
“So, please never hesitate to reach out to me, your nearest Fed rep or any branch official you feel comfortable talking to, because you’re never alone.”
The report findings – which can be found in more detail on the Police Oracle website – come at a time when Oscar Kilo, the National Police Wellbeing Service, has recently launched its Mental Health Crisis Line.
This is a 24/7 helpline exclusively for police officers and staff and can be contacted on 0300 131 2789.
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