Sick leave due to mental health issues (FOI)

​Request

Would it be possible to provide the statistics relating to the number of people who, during this time of significant change within the Government of Jersey and during mental health awareness week, are currently signed off from work with stress, anxiety, low mood, depression and how long these episodes have been ongoing?

Response

24 individual instances were recorded of staff being absent from work due to a mental health absence between 13 May and 30 June 2019. The length of these absences vary. Any further information related to these episodes is exempt from disclosure under Article 25 (Personal Information) of the Freedom of Information (Jersey) Law 2011 as this could identify individuals.

Please note staff may choose not to disclose the reason for their illness where they are absent for a short period. In addition a medical certificate may be coded where the staff member does not want to disclose their illness. In these cases, they will not be included in the data shown and consequently the data provided cannot be exhaustive.

Article applied

Article 25 Personal information

(1) Information is absolutely exempt information if it constitutes personal data of which the applicant is the data subject as defined in the Data Protection (Jersey) Law 2018.

(2) Information is absolutely exempt information if –

(a) it constitutes personal data of which the applicant is not the data subject as defined in the Data Protection (Jersey) Law 2018; and

(b) its supply to a member of the public would contravene any of the data protection principles, as defined in that Law.

(3) In determining for the purposes of this Article whether the lawfulness principle in Article 8(1)(a) of the Data Protection (Jersey) Law 2018 would be contravened by the disclosure of information, paragraph 5(1) of Schedule 2 to that Law (legitimate interests) is to be read as if sub-paragraph (b) (which disapplies the provision where the controller is a public authority) were omitted.