CEO Update - What's the plan for mental health?
What's the plan for mental health?
Last week, and again this week, we have written to all leaders asking them to outline their plans for mental health policy during the election campaign. Today, Friday 18 April, The Australian Greens have released their policy with a link below. We are still waiting to see clear and considered policy from the Coalition and Labor, and here's hoping we don't have to wait too long. You could ask them too – send copies of these letters (links below) and post them on your social media with the hashtag #mentalhealthvotes.
Dear Prime Minister Morrison, Mr Bill Shorten, and Dr Di Natale,
In the lead up to this important election, I write to ask you to lay out your plans for the mental health of all Australians.
Your plans for the one in five Australians who report serious mental illness each year.
Your plans for the children who, with the right support early, might avoid mental illness.
Your plans for those who, while ill today, could enjoy better mental health tomorrow.
Your plans for the workforce who work tirelessly in a fragmented system, often in the face of unreasonable demands and great policy uncertainty.
Your plans for the families and friends who offer unpaid support as carers.
Your plans for workplaces, where lost productivity and lost opportunities for early intervention leave us with greater human suffering and lesser national productivity than we could otherwise enjoy.
As the Treasurer said in his Budget Speech this year, “mental health is an issue of deep concern to all Australians.”
As the Labor party announced recently “we need to take more action on mental health because it is the right thing to do – for Australians living with mental ill health, their families and the broader community”.
As Greens Senator Rachel Siewert said recently "Australians struggling with mental ill health already have the odds stacked against them with insufficient mental health services".
Australians who will all head to the ballot box in May.
Voters who are all entitled to know what your plans are to address the mental health of all Australians.
And like all Australians, I await your response.
Warm regards,
Frank Quinlan
Chief Executive Officer
Link to Letter to the Prime Minister
Link to Letter to Mr Bill Shorten
Link to Letter to Dr Richard Di Natale
Our submission to the Productivity Commission Inquiry into mental health
Last week Mental Health Australia provided its first submission to the Productivity Commission Inquiry into mental health. The submission provides preliminary advice to the Productivity Commission about how to target its Inquiry both in relation to the suite and mix of mental health services needed, and the structures which underpin those services and enable integration across the social determinants of mental health.
Despite numerous inquiries into mental health with minimal impact, Mental Health Australia has welcomed the inquiry with hope because of its unique focus on the impact of mental health on economic and social participation.
Australia’s mental health system has been shaped by our legacy health financing arrangements and as a result investment has focussed primarily on a narrow biomedical model. If the existing mix of mental health governance, finance, services and programs were working effectively, Australians would not be experiencing the levels of social exclusion, distress, illness, lost productivity and premature death that are so prevalent today. Demand for mental health services and programs currently outstrips supply at almost every level of care and for more than a decade, mental health services have been subject to unprecedented uncertainty.
If this Inquiry is successful, in ten years Australians should be able to celebrate how it incrementally but fundamentally changed the landscape of mental health in Australia. It should outline radical systemic reform but also be mindful of institutional stability. Australia should be able to measure a significant increase in mental health, in social and economic participation, in the nation’s productivity and in increased access to mental health services. In order to reach this point, the Productivity Commission will need to consider both the type and mix of services needed and also the intergovernmental governance and finance arrangements required to support the optimal mix of services and programs. The Productivity Commission should make recommendations that acknowledge and build on the strengths of existing services and system structures, while also recommending a planned and orderly transition to new arrangements. The Productivity Commission should also continue to listen to the voices of mental health consumers and carers. Through lived experience expertise the Productivity Commission will be able to better understand the current barriers to realising mental health and begin to envisage solutions that will make a real impact.
You can read the full submission at the Mental Health Australia website here.
Congratulations to Tom Dalton, new CEO of Neami National
Congratulations to Tom Dalton on being appointed the new CEO of Neami International. We look forward to working with him upon his commencement in June this year.
Easter period closure
Our offices will be closed over the Easter long weekend period, reopening on Tuesday 23 April, and closed again on ANZAC Day. There will be several staff absences over this period as well, and we apologise in advance for any delayed responses during this time.
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