Stress-related employee disability claims are on the increase in the Republic, and were a major contributory cause to the 50 per cent increase in disability claims filed over the last four years, according to the Society of Actuaries in Ireland.

A recent meeting of the society was told that two main factors responsible for the rise in stress-related claims: the level of scrutiny which individual employees' performance was being subjected to and the fact that companies, including those which were performing well, were undergoing restructuring at a faster rate to improve competitiveness.