The Headline Number
New Zealand’s construction sector loses one worker to suicide every week. Construction workers are nine times more likely to die by suicide than to die in a workplace accident — the comparison is not designed to minimise the importance of physical safety, but to make clear that the mental health challenge is proportionally larger, more persistent, and less well-addressed by current industry practice.
The 2025 MATES in Construction wellbeing survey, drawing on responses from more than 3,300 workers across construction, manufacturing, and infrastructure, provides the most comprehensive picture of this crisis that the sector has produced to date.
What Workers Are Experiencing
Fifty percent of survey respondents reported living with pain, illness, or disability — more than double the national adult rate. Forty percent cited exhaustion as a key stressor. Twenty-three percent flagged high workload pressure. Twenty-nine percent identified financial stress as a significant concern. The combination of physical discomfort, work pressure, and financial strain produces exactly the conditions under which mental health deteriorates and crisis becomes possible.
Primary stressors identified in the survey include exhaustion from sustained heavy workloads, time pressure, fear of making costly mistakes, and the chronic financial uncertainty that characterises variable income in the construction sector. These are structural conditions — not individual failures — and they require structural responses.
What MATES Has Found Works
The survey data reveals a critical metric: only 2.6 percent of highly engaged MATES users reported suicidal tendencies, compared to 4.7 percent among workers with little or no programme engagement. The difference is not attributable to the engaged workers being healthier to begin with — it reflects the measurable protective effect of mateship, connection, and accessible support.
The findings helped secure government funding for a 24/7 MATES helpline, which provides immediate access to trained support without the wait times associated with general mental health services. They also informed the government’s suicide prevention planning — an outcome that demonstrates how industry-specific research can move policy in a way that general population data cannot.
What Employers Can Do
ASB has partnered with MATES to develop “Nail Your Finances” — a free financial literacy workshop targeted specifically at construction workers, addressing the financial stress that the survey identifies as one of the most consistent contributors to poor mental health in the sector. Financial education delivered in a context workers recognise and trust is more effective than generic budgeting advice.
Beyond specific programmes, the survey’s findings point to the foundational importance of workload management, fair pay, and genuine workplace connection. Employers who address these structural conditions create the environment in which wellbeing initiatives can take hold. Programmes alone cannot fix a workplace where chronic overwork and financial pressure are the baseline.
