Corporate report

Voluntary report on disability, mental health and wellbeing 2023 to 2025

Updated 5 February 2026

Foreword  

HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) collects the money that powers public services, supporting the government’s Plan for Change and vital missions like the NHS, safe streets, children’s futures, and clean energy. To help us to do that, we need to look after our people. We’re building a high-performing organisation with a skilled and engaged workforce where colleagues feel trusted, respected and supported. This will help us to retain and recruit the people and skills we need and ultimately deliver better services for the millions of our customers who rely on us.

HMRC is committed to creating a culture that recognises the value and importance of a working environment that supports the health and wellbeing of our colleagues. As HMRC’s Wellbeing Champion, I am personally dedicated to listening and taking action to provide appropriate support where all our people can thrive and improve their working experience.

Myrtle Lloyd, HMRC Wellbeing Champion, Chief Customer Officer and Director General Customer Services Group

Voluntary reporting framework

The voluntary reporting framework was developed by the government in partnership with large employers and expert partners (including leading charities) to support organisations to record and voluntarily report information on disability, mental health and wellbeing in the workplace.

This report provides an overview and highlights some of the progress we have made over the last 2 years. It also includes additional measures we will deliver to better support our colleagues.

Voluntary reporting on disability

HMRC uses the social model of disability, the definition of which is that people are disabled by the barriers in society and the workplace, not by their impairment or difference.

For example, for our customers we provide a range of accessible alternatives for disabled customers who need them. This includes offering different ways to access our services, providing information in alternative formats and ensuring our digital services meet accessibility standards.

For our colleagues, we provide comprehensive guidance and support to vacancy holders and line managers about reasonable adjustments for job applicants and new recruits. This helps ensure disabled colleagues receive appropriate support from the application stage through to employment and career development.

We have been awarded Level 3 Leader status under the government accredited Disability Confident scheme. This means we have provided evidence that we are taking effective action organisationally to progress disability inclusion for employees and customers.

We maintain a Workplace Adjustment policy and accompanying guidance to support disabled colleagues who need adjustments to remove barriers in the workplace. Our Expert Advice Service and Occupational Health provider give additional specialist advice and recommendations where someone has complex needs. Further support is available to disabled colleagues through the employee Disability Network which provides peer support and signposts colleagues to relevant guidance, as well as providing insight to the organisation on disability inclusion. We must legally meet our obligations under the Public Sector Equality Duty, and like other large organisations, we have Staff Diversity Networks.

We encourage all colleagues to voluntarily self-report their characteristics, including disability status, through our online HR system. This allows us to better understand our workforce and the communities they represent, as well as demonstrating how we represent the communities we serve. Work is ongoing to increase our diversity declaration rates so that we can more accurately identify and address challenges.

We continued to embed our Inclusion Approach in 2024 to 2025, focusing on inclusion as a broader picture of the different characteristics and experiences that make us who we are, beyond and including any protected characteristics. As part of this work, we regularly review our areas of focus to make sure we continually see positive change.

Our equality objectives for 2024 to 2028 support the delivery of our statutory responsibilities. They demonstrate how HMRC is becoming a more inclusive, respectful and representative organisation, helping us to focus our efforts on the areas where we know there are the greatest barriers for colleagues.

These objectives apply to our work with employees and customers, and they cover all areas of equality, diversity and inclusion:

1. Inclusive: we will ensure our physical and digital environments are inclusive and accessible, enabling colleagues to do their best work.

2. Respectful: we will provide a fair, kind and human culture with a strong sense of belonging and working environments where colleagues can thrive and learn.

3. Representative: we will build and maintain a diverse and inclusive workforce, reflective of all the communities we serve across all grades, groups, and regions.

Under Objective 2 we have a specific success measure for the improved experience of the provision of workplace adjustments for disabled colleagues. In 2024 to 2025 we began a project focusing on improving the understanding and provision of workplace adjustments to improve employee experience. A key part of this work was reviewing our processes and guidance, ensuring they are fit for purpose, and the creation of easier to navigate webpages which include key information on areas we know colleagues wanted more support on.

For example, de-mystifying Access to Work, having good conversations about how to put the right reasonable adjustments in place, and consolidating guidance for the disposal of equipment relating to adjustments. Overall, this work has clarified and simplified policies, with the aim of empowering managers to make decisions that support their teams.

We have also refreshed our Recruitment Policy, ensuring it is centred around inclusion and fairness. As a result, HMRC now has centralised recruitment activity with a core team administering all reasonable adjustment requests, ensuring straightforward requests are actioned swiftly and bespoke requests are handled by experts.

In 2025 to 2026, the project scope has widened to look more broadly at actions to improve the workplace and recruitment experience for colleagues with disabilities.

We are working closely with key stakeholders, including central teams and our employee Disability Network, to identify challenges and blockers which prevent disabled colleagues from working effectively and progressing their careers. We have been gathering data from focus groups, Disability Network meetings, staff surveys, and engaged with other government departments, to identify best practice and shape evidence-based interventions.

In line with the Equality Act 2010 and Public Sector Equality Duty, HMRC has equality objectives that apply to both our customers and colleagues. You can find more information in HMRC equality objectives 2024 to 2028. You can also find further information on how we meet our responsibilities under the Public Sector Equality Duty (PSED) in our annually published PSED report.

Voluntary reporting on mental health and wellbeing

We have continued to work to the standards outlined in the Thriving at Work report (The Stevenson/Farmer review of mental health and employers, 2017) and the Mental Health at Work Commitment (2019).

HMRC’s Wellbeing Strategy is underpinned by a comprehensive wellbeing offer. In 2024 we reviewed our offer against the Civil Service Health and Wellbeing Standards, developed to guide departments to deliver a consistent and best practice health and wellbeing offer to all civil servants. They are framed by the Civil Service health and wellbeing strategic priorities and have been developed as the minimum standards of good practice departments are expected to have in place.

Our wellbeing offer includes:

• expert advice and support from a dedicated Health, Safety and Wellbeing team
• access to a range of health and wellbeing guidance and people policies
• mental health and wellbeing learning delivered through a range of channels, from e-learning, pre-recorded broadcasts, to virtual webinars and interactive workshops
• Employee Assistance Programme (EAP) services to help colleagues manage personal and work-related issues affecting their wellbeing. Services include a 24/7 helpline for emotional support, structured short-term workplace counselling where clinically recommended, self-help resources and mental health and wellbeing webinars. A dedicated management support helpline provides managers with confidential, impartial and professional support in handling a wide range of workplace issues. ‘Health Station’ machines are available in Regional Centre wellbeing rooms for colleagues to take key health checks such as blood pressure
• professional clinical advice from the Occupational Health (OH) service
• provision of professional eyecare advice and services including Display Screen Equipment, safety and driver eyecare
• a national network of Mental Health Advocates (MHA) to provide a confidential listening ear and signposting to support
• a Wellness Plan to provide practical support and facilitate conversations between the colleague and their manager
• a Stress Management Plan taking a risk assessment approach to identifying stressors and agree actions to reduce or remove the impact
• a Stress Tool for teams, aligned to Health and Safety Executive best practice
• peer support from colleague led support groups, networks and communities to help colleagues to connect and share experiences
• support from external partners including the Charity for Civil Servants for financial, emotional and practical help (available to all current, former and retired civil servants)
• a range of employee benefits, including a discount scheme for colleagues to use
• health and wellbeing awareness through communications and campaigns, building awareness of different health matters and promoting the wellbeing offer and events to enable colleagues to make informed choices when seeking support

During the last reporting period our activity included:

• development of a bespoke induction package containing all the important information and learning resources to support new and returning managers
• a refreshed Management Development Programme to support new and less experienced managers (including essential management skills, techniques and practices) and experienced leaders (addressing the more challenging aspects of leadership and management)
• promoting mental health and wellbeing learning through Civil Service Learning and working with our EAP to develop new webinars and products with specific support for colleagues in customer engagement roles
• continuing to promote healthy lifestyles and help available for colleagues to manage their health and wellbeing through regular communications and campaigns
• a flu immunisation programme through a voucher scheme via our OH provider for colleagues not eligible for the free NHS vaccination
• continuing to provide ongoing support, learning and development to our national network of MHAs to enable them to provide support and signpost colleagues experiencing mental ill health — activity included upskilling sessions and an annual virtual conference to share best practice and encourage collaboration
• a new Organisational Stress Risk Assessment to help HMRC to identify and manage the causes of workplace stress at a departmental level — it also supports managers to complete team activity risk assessments to make sure there are suitable control measures in place to prevent and manage work-related stress
• continuing to support our Mental Health Network to share colleague’s personal stories and experiences of mental ill health to encourage open and supportive conversations in the workplace

In the coming year we will refresh our Wellbeing Strategy to address the next stage of further embedding wellbeing into our culture and how we work.

Health and wellbeing data

In HMRC we have a range of metrics in place to measure workplace wellbeing. These include Civil Service People Survey indicators which include Office for National Statistics (ONS) personal wellbeing questions, Proxy Stress index and PERMA (Positive Emotion, Engagement, Relationships, Meaning, Accomplishments) index.

Personal wellbeing

We measure personal wellbeing through the annual Civil Service People Survey using the same 4 questions used by the ONS to monitor wellbeing across the UK, as part of their Measuring National Wellbeing Programme.

The questions relate to 3 positive wellbeing measures — how satisfied people are with their life, whether they feel they have meaning and purpose (things they do are worthwhile) and how happy they felt during a particular period, along with one negative measure — how anxious they felt during a particular period.

Levels for personal wellbeing have remained consistent since 2022. A 1% negative increase was reported in the proportion of colleagues rating their anxiety levels. The change is relatively small, and overall, the picture for this reporting period is of general stability.

Question	2024 %	2023 %	2022 %
Overall, how satisfied are you with your life nowadays?	63	63	63
Overall, to what extent do you think the things you do in your life are worthwhile?	67	67	67
Overall, how happy did you feel yesterday?	59	59	59
Overall, how anxious did you feel yesterday?	37	36	36

Proxy Stress index

The Proxy Stress index uses Civil Service People Survey questions to align to the Health and Safety Executive’s Management Standards to give a measure of the conditions which can contribute to (or reduce) stressful environments in the workplace.

Factors include workload, control over how work is done, support and relationships and how change is managed. The higher the index score represents a more stressful environment.

There was a 1% negative increase in our Proxy Stress index in 2024.

PERMA index

We use a PERMA index to measure the extent to which HMRC colleagues are flourishing in the workplace. This index combines measures of Positive Emotion, Engagement, Relationships, sense of Meaning and sense of Accomplishment. The higher the index score represents higher levels of flourishing and engagement.

Our work-related PERMA index has remained consistent since 2023.

The changes for our Proxy Stress and PERMA are relatively small and overall, the picture for this reporting period is of general stability.

Year	Proxy % — the higher the score represents a more stressful environment	PERMA % — the higher the score represents higher levels of flourishing
2024	29	71
2023	28	71
2022	28	72