Celia Hammond (Curtin, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise today to talk about mental health, noting that today is the launch of the third annual End Youth Suicide campaign of Youth Insearch. The goal of this charity is to raise awareness of youth suicide and help prevent it. Suicide is the leading cause of death in young Australians aged from 15 to 24 years of age, and this is a fact which should alarm every single person. It is true that, as a society, we are getting better at having conversations about our own mental health, and many of us in this place get to see the vital work that mental health charities and organisations do in our own electorates on a daily basis, like the work in my electorate by Million Minds or the research being done by UWA researchers involved with the Young Minds Matter project. It's also true that, over the last couple of years, the Commonwealth government has prioritised and invested record amounts in services to support the mental health of Australians.

In 2020 alone, the government's total commitment to mental health support was $5.7 billion, and we are currently driving the largest expansion of the youth mental health service headspace, investing $630.4 million over the next four years. Yet the challenge mental health presents does not abate, and what was already a crisis will simply be magnified by the long-term mental health implications of the COVID-19 pandemic. Last year we saw an increase in demand for mental health services. To put this in perspective, between 7 September and 4 October, there was a 15 per cent increase in Medicare subsidised mental health services and, in the four weeks to 4 October 2020, there was an 18 per cent increase in individuals accessing Lifeline. While those numbers are promising in some respects because they do mean that people are aware of their mental health and are seeking help, we can't always say with certainty that they are getting the treatment that is responsive to their needs.

As the Productivity Commission's report into mental health which was released last year made very clear, Australia's current mental health system is not comprehensive and fails to provide the treatment and support that people who need it legitimately expect. To be clear, this report lays out some stark facts which do not make for easy reading, but, rather than respond negatively or try to just reject, we should look at some of the positives that are outlined and then use the rest as an opportunity to improve the system. The government should be commended for the work it has done to support the mental health of Australians—particularly telehealth, which has been extremely effective and which I hope will be continued and built upon, as it is a flexible and accessible way to deliver mental health services. But we also must give due consideration to the comprehensive set of recommended reforms in the commission's report which are intended to set the mental health system on a path towards a person centred model. As the commission's report makes clear, reforms of the mental health system would produce large benefits, with improvements in quality of life valued at up to $18 billion per year. In particular, the commission identified two key gaps in Australia's clinical mental health care—a low-intensity gap and a missing-middle gap, and I recognise that people like Professor McGorry have already spoken at length on the missing-middle gap.

Currently, if you are worried about your mental health, you will most likely see your GP, as they are still the primary pathway for a lot of mental health matters. Around five million Australians go to their GP for assistance with their mental health each year. Six out of 10 of these appointments result in a prescription for medication and two in 10 result in a referral to a psychologist or psychiatrist. The commission report notes that there is still a large underrepresentation of people accessing low-intensity services which may better suit an individual's needs. This can include services like Beyond Blue's NewAccess program. The commission's report highlights that there's a clear information barrier about low-intensity services that affects patients and professionals alike, and it notes that 2.5 million people could benefit from these types of services. It also identifies that service underprovision is the chief cause of the 'missing middle' gap, and I know this to be true from constituents communicating with me about the waitlists that they face to see certain specialists.

There is never going to be some grand panacea to resolve every issue in the mental health system, and the scale of reforms recommended will take time, but I think the commission's report makes very clear the direction governments, both state and federal, need to be heading to improve our mental health system and outcomes for individuals.