Taking action to tackle suicide
Julia Gillard,Nicola Roxon
posted Tuesday, 27 July 2010
A Gillard Labor Government will invest in a comprehensive package of measures to tackle suicide and promote better mental health in our community.
More than 2000 Australians take their lives every year. This is a national tragedy – affecting individuals, families, and those communities in which someone has taken their own life.
A Gillard Labor Government’s comprehensive package to prevent the tragedy of suicide and promote better mental health will:
- Boost frontline services for people at greatest risk.
- Invest more in direct suicide prevention and crisis intervention.
- Provide more services and support to men.
- Promote good mental health and resilience in young people.
This comprehensive package of services will redouble our national efforts to prevent suicide in order to reduce the tragic toll it imposes on the many people it affects.
Boosting frontline services for people at greatest risk
A Gillard Labor Government will invest $113.9 million to provide more frontline services in the community for people with severe mental illness. In particular, funding will target people who have attempted suicide, as they are at greatest risk.
Commencing in July next year, this investment will include:
- $22.9 million to provide psychological counselling services for around 12,500 people each year who have attempted or are at risk of suicide, to help reduce repeated attempts at suicide.
- $22 million to improve access to specialist psychiatry services in the community for people with severe mental illness, by providing around 20,000 specialist psychiatry sessions in the community each year.
- $60 million to boost access to support services for the severely mentally ill. Examples include structured social activity, assistance with managing day to day activities, and critically – respite for carers of people with severe mental illness.
It will also include establishment of an annual National Report Card on mental health and suicide prevention, and a new requirement for Medicare Locals and Local Hospital Networks to report on the performance of mental health services.
This will drive greater accountability in the sector and ensure that these and existing investments in mental health services are delivering better outcomes.
Investing more in direct suicide prevention and crisis intervention
A Gillard Labor Government will invest $74.3 million in direct suicide prevention and crisis intervention services. Commencing in July next year, this investment includes:
- $18.1 million for Lifeline Australia’s support hotlines to be able to take more calls, for calls to Lifeline from mobiles to be toll-free, and for Lifeline to establish access to dedicated help lines at suicide ‘hotspots’.
- $9 million to improve safety at suicide ‘hotspots’, such as the Gap in Sydney.
- $6.1 million to train frontline community workers such as financial, legal and relationship counsellors with ‘mental health first aid’ training – so they can better identify and respond to the needs of people at risk of suicide or who have attempted suicide.
- $18.7 million to establish outreach teams to schools affected by suicide, supporting young people whose schoolmates have taken their own lives and reducing the chances of ‘copycat’ suicides.
- $22.4 million to improve community-led suicide prevention services – targeted at groups and communities which are at high risk of suicide, including Indigenous people, men, and gay, lesbian and bisexual people.
Providing more services and support to men
Men are far more likely than women to commit suicide and nearly three-quarters of men do not seek help for mental health problems.
Building on Australia’s first ever men’s health policy released earlier this year, a re-elected Gillard Labor Government will invest $22.8 million in providing more services and programs targeted at men to ensure more men get the mental health help that they need:
- $11 million will be provided to expand Beyondblue’s National Workplace Program to help an additional 350 workplaces each year identify and support workers with depression.
- $2.8 million to increase the capacity of Beyondblue’s helpline to provide information and assistance to up to 30,000 more men each year.
- $9 million for targeted campaigns on mental health for men – to reduce stigma associated with mental illness and encourage more men to seek help.
These initiatives will commence at the start of next year.
Promoting good mental health and resilience in young people
A Gillard Labor Government will invest $65.9 million in providing more services for children with mental health problems, and promoting resilience and good mental health in young people.
Overwhelmingly, the evidence shows early intervention reduces the incidence and severity of problems later in life.
This investment will include:
- $19.6 million to expand the Kidsmatter initiative to about 1700 more primary schools, increasing the number of schools currently in the program fivefold from the start of next year. This will mean that around 348,000 additional children will benefit from services to promote good mental health and improve children’s resilience by teacher and parent training and awareness.
- $24.0 million to train frontline health and community workers to better identify and support children with serious mental health, developmental and behavioural issues, commencing in July next year. This will also provide additional services to treat around 26,000 young people.
- $22.3 million to boost online mental health and counselling services – to give young people who are reluctant or unable to access face-to-face mental health services an alternative avenue through which to seek help, commencing in April next year.
Building on a strong record
These investments build on Federal Labor’s recent investments in mental health, which include a doubling of the current number of headspace services for young people, and more funding for coordinated care for people with serious mental illness.
The Gillard Labor Government is also investing $1.6 billion for 1,300 more sub-acute beds, including more mental health sub-acute beds.
As part of the establishment of the National Health and Hospitals Network, the Gillard Labor Government is building the foundations of the health system on which we can offer better health services to Australians, including mental health services.
Our reforms and investments in primary care will help to provide better coordinated care for people with mental illness – so that the mentally ill are less likely to fall through the gaps in the system.
The investments we are making now are a down payment to address the immediate service gaps in mental health – but we know there is more to do.
In contrast, the Coalition want to fund their mental health spending by cutting health programs, including important funding to improve GP services and facilities in more than 400 communities, the GP after hours helpline and e-health records.
The Gillard Labor Government is improving health services, including mental health services, not cutting them.
The $276.9 million in funding for these investments will be fully offset over the forward estimates, consistent with the Gillard Labor Government’s commitment to return the Budget to surplus in three years.
Need someone to talk to? Call Lifeline on 13 11 14.
Mental health: Taking action to tackle suicide
Tags: gillard, government, Health, julia, labor, mental, nicola, policy, roxon