Ross Hart (Bass, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I chose to speak on this motion on Wednesday last week. Over a five-year period from 2012 to 2016 the average number of suicide deaths per year was 2,795. 2016 preliminary data showed a total of 2,866 deaths by suicide. That is approximately seven per day, and 178 people attempt per day. Since last Wednesday 890 people have thought they had no other choice available to them but to attempt suicide and 35 have lost their lives and are lost to us, their families and their communities—people who deserve to be more than a statistic. The ripples through our community run from each completed suicide. Many ask the question 'Why?' In addition to that we often feel a certain sense of helplessness and of what might have been. 'What if' scenarios abound. Sometimes the sense of loss and of responsibility in turn create their own problems as the ripples of loss create further effects disturbing lives in unforeseen ways.

I remember now how that felt to me15 years ago. A young, vibrant and hardworking employee went home to an empty house. For whatever the final reason she could not bear her life and elected to take steps which resulted in her death. I know it's hard for her family to accept she may have intended suicide. I made successive calls to her workmates that awful day, the emotion of each call like a stab through the heart—shock, disbelief and regret. Some staff members were in turn deeply affected, showing in very real terms what the ripples of disturbance from suicide mean in practice. Counselling and support services help but don't replace the loss or salve the pain, even when that pain is a shared experience. In preparing this speech the memories came flooding back, at times so vivid that I cannot contemplate what it's like for a person to lose their daughter, a partner or a loved one.

On Friday I received a message which again emphasised the immediacy and currency of this issue, another friend, a colleague, a highly respected leader and mentor to many, was lost. The media reported, 'died suddenly', that awful code. Again, there was shock, disbelief and even anger, with colleagues again lamenting a departed, respected friend.

R U OK? is intended to empower us to ask that difficult question, but the alternative to asking that difficult question is, indeed, much worse: the inevitable disbelief and the 'why' when someone attempts and completes the act of suicide. Better to ask the difficult question, to ask whether a friend or a colleague is okay, than to regret not asking the question. Better to activate your better instincts and judgement as to a person's outward appearance. If things appear not quite right, ask the question, 'Are you okay?' The question may prompt a response which in turn demands further action, but if R U OK? is to be effective to save lives and prompt a friend or colleague to say no then each of us bear the responsibility to act.

What does acting in response to your question look like? Suggestions published in connection with R U OK? Day include: ask what is going on in their lives, listen actively and ask, 'How can I help or is there something I can do for you right now?' Sometimes it's about keeping them company, providing practical support or linking them with health professionals. Direct questions, in particular about self-harm, can be asked. It's okay to ask whether somebody has considered killing themselves. In asking those questions it is better to be nonjudgemental rather than clothing questions around, 'Don't do anything silly.'

Finally, consider doing a course on mental health first aid. Like with traditional first-aid techniques, the training teaches people how to offer additional support until appropriate professional help is received or until a crisis is resolved. It's possible to be the person who is able to act coolly in a crisis. It is possible for that person to ask the question, 'Are you okay?'

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