Cognitive strain in Parliament: How can we reduce psychological stressors to improve policy-making? Andrew Baldwin, Cynthia Pinto, Saskia Perriard-Abdoh, & Ashley Weinberg October 2020 PSYCHOLOGICAL PSYCHOLOGICAL GOVERNMENT BPS POLICY TEAM DIRECTORY KATHRYN SCOTT Director of Policy NIGEL ATTER Policy Advisor, Children and Young People ANDREW BALDWIN Policy Advisor, Work JOE LIARDET Policy Coordinator, Consultations [email protected] NIC MURRAY Policy Advisor, Social Justice SASKIA PERRIARD-ABDOH Policy and Government Relations Manager, Health and Psychological Government Programme Lead GEORGE WILKINSON Policy Officer [email protected] © 2020 The British Psychological Society All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording or any information storage retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. Contents About the British Psychological Society 5 Acknowledgements 5 About the Psychological Government Programme 7 Introduction 8 Occupational psychology and politics 9 Psychological stressors in Parliament? 10 Expectations 10 The pressures of social media 12 Distrust 13 Political labour 14 Organisational culture 16 Leadership 18 Temporal 19 Lifestyle 20 Control 21 Skills 21 Conclusion 22 COGNITIVE STRAIN IN PARLIAMENT STRAIN IN COGNITIVE Recommendations 22 Appendix A 24 A note on methodology 24 Interview guide 24 References 25 3 Psychological Government COGNITIVE STRAIN IN PARLIAMENT STRAIN IN COGNITIVE 4 Psychological Government About the British Psychological Society The British Psychological Society (BPS) is We support and enhance the development the representative body for psychology and and application of psychology for the greater psychologists in the UK. We are responsible public good. We set high standards for for the promotion of excellence and ethical research, education and knowledge, and seek practice in the science, education, and to disseminate this to increase wider public practical applications of psychology. We have awareness of psychology and its importance. 60,000 members and subscribers across As part of this work we want to ensure that the the UK, ranging from students to qualified value of psychology to society is recognised chartered psychologists. by policy-makers and used to inform policy development across government. Acknowledgements This document was written by Andrew Baldwin, The authors would also like to thank the Cynthia Pinto, Saskia Perriard-Abdoh & Ashley individuals who agreed to be interviewed Weinberg. It is part of British Psychological through the course of this project. Society’s ongoing Psychological Government programme. The authors would like to thank their fellow steering group members for their ongoing time and support: John Amaechi OBE, Eleonore Batteux, Angel Chater, Rob Hutton, Emily McBride, Tony Munton, Cynthia Pinto, Gavin Sullivan. We are also especially thankful to Roxane Gervais and Georgina Kester for their time and comments. COGNITIVE STRAIN IN PARLIAMENT STRAIN IN COGNITIVE 5 Psychological Government rogramme About the Psychological P Government Programme Terms such as ‘place-making’, ‘people-centred’ and ‘wellbeing’ are back on the policy agenda. These are all new potential approaches to developing policy. There is an appetite in government for a ‘new way of doing things’ and developing an evidence-based policy-making framework. However, while the need to bring people (and their psychology) into the policy-making process is well understood, there is often a lack of clarity regarding how this can be done. overnment Policies fail and governments don’t get re-elected if they don’t connect with the G people they serve. This can be linked to an inherent flaw or missed opportunity within the design of the policy itself; a lack of understanding of the environmental or social contexts – namely place; or the failure to understand and include the people affected by these decisions which can in turn lead to feelings of inequality, disenfranchisement, stigma and populism. It is at this junction between people, place and policy that psychology and psychologists can provide insights, expertise and frameworks of thinking. The BPS Psychological Government Programme aims to offer a way to move past these barriers by identifying, developing and delivering a psychological approach to policy-making, which places people first. For further information, please contact [email protected]. sychological P the bout A 7 Psychological Government Introduction ‘The workload of the MP is greater at the ramifications faced by our elected beginning of the 21st century than at representatives once they enter parliament? any time in the history of the House of Like many jobs, working as an MP opens the Commons. Public expectations of our elected individual up to a wide range of additional representatives have also grown. Yet this psychological stressors. Stress, depression or increased pressure has not been matched anxiety account for 44 per cent of all UK’s by concomitant improvements to facilities, work-related ill health cases and 54 per cent hours or procedures. In order to improve the of its working days are lost due to ill health.2 effectiveness and efficiency of Parliament, While parliamentary specific figures are not and its Members, tangible reform is required. currently available, data shows that those The alternative is a growing disparity between working in public service roles tend to have expectation and reality, which can only lead higher levels of stress when compared to to a further erosion of support for Parliament’ all jobs.3 (Hansard Society, 2000). This briefing looks at Parliament through Being an MP does not come with a formal job an occupational psychology lens and a description, and the working realities of our framework of nine psychological stressors. elected politicians are complex. We know from Does our Parliamentary system allow us current psychological evidence that work plays to get the best out of our elected officials, a central role in our identity and meaningful and if not, then what can be done to make activity in life is key to wellbeing.1 This applies parliament a psychologically safer workplace? as much to politicians as it does to any other Through interviews with current and former job. While other high-stress professions have MPs, researchers and constituency staff, it been studied from an occupational psychology provides an understanding of the psychological perspective, this has not occurred to a large pressures that MPs work under, the cognitive extent within parliamentarians. This briefing strain this creates, and the impact these asks, from a psychological perspective, stressors can have on work performance. We what the role of an MP actually looks like also aim to develop an evidence-based route to in practice, and what are the psychological COGNITIVE STRAIN IN PARLIAMENT STRAIN IN COGNITIVE building psychologically healthy workplaces in Parliaments across the UK and beyond. 8 Psychological Government Occupational psychology and politics Psychological stress and cognitive strain are • The mixed impact of reform of debating not new concerns. When providing evidence to hours in the House of Commons– with the Modernisation Committee of the House of particularly negative results for MPs with Commons almost 30 years ago, Edwina Currie constituencies further from London. MP highlighted the personal fallout evidenced MPs’ experience of stress can vary over by, ‘broken health, ruined marriages and time and is, on average, comparable with exhausted irrationality’.4 In How to be an MP, the psychological strain reported by senior the veteran Labour MP Paul Flynn outlined managers8 and the general population.9,10 some of the day-to-day issues that can impact However, this masks an underlying trend on an MP’s psychological health: that when factors relating to age and sex are ‘An ungrateful constituent abuses the staff. controlled for, rates of poor psychological A strong case to reverse an injustice fails. A health are doubled for MPs compared to the tabloid savages a pet cause. The MP bombs general population.11 in a crowded Commons. A loved constituent Given the common negative psychological dies prematurely. A constituency firm loses outcomes, it can be difficult to understand the hundreds of jobs. A political enemy wounds appeal of working in a political environment with a bull’s eye attack.’ 5 and what motivates people to pursue this path. The first study of the psychological wellbeing However all the MPs and staffers interviewed of MPs took place in 1992 following concerns for this project said that the ability to make a expressed by politicians themselves about the difference for constituents by ‘providing people impact of long and unpredictable hours on their with clarity of how Parliament works, or how ability to function effectively at work and their a piece of legislation is going to affect their relationships with their families.6 Concerns were life’ and the potential to make lasting, positive raised about the toll of the job on individual political change were important psychological MPs and their families, but also about the motivators. impact on their psychological and physical One MP pointed out there was ‘no other job capacity to function in their professional roles. that I know of where you can create and run COGNITIVE STRAIN IN PARLIAMENT STRAIN IN COGNITIVE These concerns can have a huge psychological your own