Anthony Byrne (Holt, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to support the member for Macquarie's private members' motion on mental health, which notes that suicide is the leading cause of death amongst Australians aged 15 to 24. If you read the statistics from the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, 384 young people took their own lives in 2019. Then, if you talk about suicide, 96 of those were by suicide. Deaths by suicide represented 40 per cent of all deaths in young people aged 15 to 17 and 36 per cent of all deaths in those aged between 18 to 24, which is up from approximately 25 per cent of all deaths in these age groups in 2010. You read that data and you're horrified.

I had the lived experience of this when we had a suicide cluster in the south-eastern region in 2011 and 2012. During that time, you would see on occasion, as you drove to work, the name of a young person on a bridge, or you'd see on Facebook the loss of a young person, and then another young person, and then another young person. There was a sense of community helplessness as to what to do. I think the member for Indi was talking about Albury and the work that Professor Pat McGorry had done there. He also did incredible work down in the south-eastern region of Melbourne during that time, which I think has literally saved lives. Because of what had actually happened prior to that and prior to Professor McGorry coming in, we actually called Pat in. He had been dealing with the issue of appropriate mental health facilities in Albury to deal with this suicide cluster, and we asked him to do the same thing, which he did.

He came down and, in 2012, we conducted a forum that was covered by Four Corners. They produced a program on it called 'There is No 3G in Heaven'. It featured some of the people we'd actually lost. We conducted that forum, with Pat McGorry facilitating it. It's impossible to describe to this chamber, or to anybody, being there and watching the parents of young people get up and describe the impact of the loss of their child. We had eight or nine parents get up and describe it, and describe how—one of the things we don't discuss is method; we don't want to discuss method. But there was a particularly brutal method being used by very desperate young people in 2011. It traumatised an entire community.

We lobbied for Professor McGorry to come down to the area. There is No 3G in Heaven is a very confronting program. As a result of that—and I pay great tribute to then mental health minister Mark Butler—two headspace centres were funded by the Gillard government and an early youth psychosis centre was overlayed with that. I think headspace Dandenong is in the electorate of the member for Bruce and I think headspace Narre Warren is now in the electorate of La Trobe, but it could also be in Bruce—who knows, with the redistribution. He might have two in his electorate, and that's a good thing. My electorate extends out to Cranbourne. It would be great to have a headspace in Cranbourne.

I welcome the investment from the federal government and also the state government. The Victorian state government has invested over $3 billion in mental health. I worked in the mental health space between 1994 and 1996 as chief executive officer of a mental health organisation. I remember participating in what was called the first national mental health strategy. The discussion was about young people and others not accessing mental health services because of the stigma. I would say that we still confront that as a barrier to people, particularly from non-English speaking backgrounds, accessing services. There are so many young people that I speak to who are struggling with issues but who still will not go to a health service provider, a doctor, or even a clinic or a headspace because of the perceived stigma of mental health issues in their community. So, whilst I welcome this investment, it is quite worrisome when you talk to a young woman who's got a tertiary degree but who wouldn't for the life of her go and access a service because of the stigma. Whilst I certainly welcome the member for Macquarie's motion, there is much, much more that needs to be done to confront the stigma so that we can encourage people to access these services. (Time expired)

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