House debates

Thursday, 25 November 2021

Committees

Mental Health and Suicide Prevention Select Committee; Report

12:04 pm

Photo of Julian SimmondsJulian Simmonds (Ryan, Liberal National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I will start where the previous contributor to this debate left off and acknowledge all the work done by the committee. The committee chair, the member for Reid, in particular, has worked incredibly hard on this report, as have all members on the committee, including me. It has been incredibly beneficial having somebody with the qualifications and passion of the member for Reid stewarding this inquiry, and this has certainly been borne out in the recommendations.

We must all work hard to break down the stigma that has historically surrounded mental health—I know that that's something that has bipartisan support—and, further, to break down the barriers that may be present that prevent anyone from connecting with the help and the services that they need in their time of need. We know early intervention is key throughout all significant stages of life. It provides support to parents through pregnancy, the foundations in schools and, then, support as children transition to adult life. I want to commend the chair for her work in detailing what needs to be done to address, in particular, the issues surrounding the need for specialist workforces to address and continue to adapt to changing environmental factors in our lives that contribute to our mental health. I also want to thank all of those who made submissions—the many organisations that lent their considerable weight and expertise to the committee's findings.

The committee recommends increased funding for specialist services such as forensic, perinatal and autism services to innovate, expand and meet demand. Dealing with these workforce issues really is the missing piece of the puzzle. As more funding is being provided by government to Medicare and to individuals to access mental health services, too many providers, especially those targeted at the young, are reporting significant issues with filling the workforce to meet demand. The fact that the committee had a significant focus on these workforce issues is to its credit.

I note also that it was pleasing to see the success of programs that were put into place during the pandemic, such as telehealth, which gave immediate access to help. There aren't too many silver linings to the COVID-19 pandemic, but this is surely one. In the normal course of business, I have no doubt that it would have taken years of consultation—probably a decade—to convince doctors and patients of the role that telehealth could play in health services. Instead, it was introduced in a matter of weeks, with patients and health professionals given a very practical demonstration of how successful it could be and the circumstances in which it could be useful. It's now an enduring legacy of the pandemic. It won't replace face-to-face health care, nor should it; that will remain paramount. But it clearly has an important role to play in ensuring that vulnerable communities have access to the services they need.

The pandemic also has elevated the importance of crisis mental health. The recommendation of the committee that the Chief Health Officer for Mental Health be present at all state and territory crisis meetings is important so that mental health considerations can be made at the time broader health orders are made. I hope to see this adopted in the future. While I don't think that considerations of those mental health impacts will change the medical advice, I hope it will ensure that mental health support that may be needed as a result of implementing some of those orders is available more quickly and to those communities that need it.

Whilst the report indeed identifies the need to prioritise youth mental health, I think there is far more that we can do. I personally have more ambition for this space than the report has and I want to see far more funding for our young people who are experiencing mental health challenges. Research clearly shows that, if we can get support for young people early, we can head off a raft of problems and pain later in life. We can assist them and prevent them from developing those chronic mental health concerns that would plague them as individuals and lead to such loss of happiness and economic potential.

The report was hesitant to single out the success of individual services, but of course I have no such hesitancy. I want to pay particular tribute to headspace for the vital work that it does for young Australians who are experiencing points of mental health crisis. It's doing magnificent work. In particular, my service in Taringa in the electorate of Ryan is the second busiest in Australia. I know that I will continue to fight for more funding, and we, as a government, need to further support and fund these centres.

I particularly know that there is extra ongoing funding on the table for these centres as a result of the recent budget. It's waiting on the support of state governments, including the Queensland government, which has shown no urgency or desire to sign up to a funding agreement with the Commonwealth. My call to them is that mental health support, particularly for young people, is beyond politics. It's something that is supported and encouraged on a bipartisan basis, and I can see no reasonable reason that the Queensland government isn't engaging in very fruitful talks with the Commonwealth government to ensure that headspace and other youth mental health services have the ongoing funding that they need.

Finally, I want to record my support for the School Chaplaincy Program. It supports over 3,000 school communities Australia wide, providing pastoral care and programs—such as breakfast clubs, activities and workshops—especially in my electorate of Ryan. Before coming to this place, I spent a decade as a local councillor working with my local schools, and I have seen firsthand, time and time again, the wonderful pastoral role that chappies play and the important impact they have in a young kid's life. They are embedded in their school community. They're strongly supported by those school communities, especially by parents, and, because they're not a teacher but one of them—so to speak—the kids feel it is much easier to talk to them about issues they might be facing both at school and at home.

I do not think there is a need to review this service, as the committee report recommends, in recommendation No. 41. I think the chappie program is effective and is greatly needed, as I have seen firsthand. But, if there is to be a review, it is my sincere expectation that its findings will show that the National School Chaplaincy Program is so effective that it should be given more funding and more support to continue the excellent work it does in our schools and to ensure it's rolled out to more schools to support the health and wellbeing of students. That's my position, and I believe it is the position of the coalition government, which has always given unwavering support to the chappie program. This committee report is the product of a lot of hard work, particularly by the chair and the committee members, and I want to thank them. I commend it to the House.

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