A survey has ranked Cardiff as the UK’s worst city for work-related stress.
Perkbox, an HR consultancy company, said the ranking was based on long working hours and commuting times.
It also found the public sector and financial industries were the most stressful environments for workers.
People responding to the survey said stress caused them to lose sleep, concentrate less, and feel more anxious.
Cardiff Liberal Democrat Councillor Emma Sandrey said “This is the second report in less than a year that’s said Cardiff is the most stressful city in the UK. I think we need to think a bit about how we weigh performance targets like the economy and schools against wellbeing and mental health.”
She added: “I’ve been signed off work myself three times due to stress, one was directly after local elections. For a lot of people it’s about having control over what they do and finding a work-life balance. I think the more flexible employers are, the more they get out of their staff.”
In Cardiff city centre, commuters’ reactions were mixed.
Mark Lines said “I can understand why commuting’s a big issue. I used to have guys coming in from the valleys to work and it was very stressful for them. One chap would turn up at seven o’clock, even though they couldn’t start till seven thirty, just to avoid the traffic.”
But for Harriet McCormick the issue was not stress in work. She said: “I don’t really get stressed at work, but financial things can be a bit of a worry”.
Others said they faced a range of pressures from social media and they no longer had periods of downtime from work.
Cardiff Council have outlined plans in their 2018-2019 budget to invest £40m to develop roads and cycle routes over the next year.
