The City of London Police has launched a health and wellbeing network to support its employees' mental and physical health.
The initiative aims to ensure employees’ health needs are supported, and ensure they have the support they need to perform their roles effectively.
The network will make existing occupational health services more visible to staff, as well as providing wellbeing information and services.
It will help to support its 1,000 employees with mental health concerns and general fitness issues.
A launch event was held on 12 April to provide employees with more information about the services available to them. The event involved health and wellbeing organisations and experts, including mental health charity Mind, a cardiologist from St Bartholomew’s Hopsital, as well as fitness advocate and former Pussycat Doll Kimberly Wyatt.
Ian Dyson, City of London Police Commissioner, said: “Police employees need to be both physically and mentally fit so they can do what is a very important job to the best of their abilities.
“We have recognised that we need to do everything within our power to support staff and officers in this area, which is why we have set up the health and wellbeing network.”
Wyatt added: “I can imagine that working within a police force can, at times, be very stressful and there is no doubt that police employees have a lot of responsibility. This kind of stress can have an impact on the health and wellbeing of a person and therefore it is important to do everything possible to alleviate this kind of stress.”
