Anne McEwen (SA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Yesterday the Senate agreed to a motion moved by Senator Stephens which acknowledged this week is Mental Health Week in Australia and that 10 October was World Mental Health Day. Mental Health Week is an annual national event that aims to improve community awareness and knowledge regarding mental health issues and illness and to reduce the stigma and discrimination associated with mental health problems.

This year the theme of Mental Health Week was ‘Building Awareness—Reducing Risks: Suicide and Mental Illness’. Mental Health Week gives members of parliament and the community the opportunity to participate in a number of activities and forums that highlight the impact of mental illnesses on individuals and on the economic and social wellbeing of our community. Senator Webber, during both of her adjournment speeches this week, mentioned some of those events held here in Parliament House this week—some of which were unfortunately open only to government members, despite a long history of bipartisan support for initiatives in raising mental health awareness and addressing mental health issues.

A comprehensive analysis of the adequacy or otherwise of government responses to mental health issues was made in the excellent report referred to earlier by Senator Webber entitled A national approach to mental health—from crisis to community. That report was published subsequent to the work of the bipartisan Senate Select Committee on Mental Health. I have to say the work of that committee exemplified the value of allowing Senate inquiries to be given the time, resources and government support to really address issues of significance to the Australian community. Unfortunately, it is not an attitude to Senate committee inquiries that we have seen in more recent times, where the government has used its numbers in this place to prevent, truncate or stack Senate committee inquiries.

As we know, the report of the Senate Select Committee on Mental Health generated an increased public awareness of the failure of government to address the crisis in mental health. The committee emphasised the need to spend a lot more money on prevention and early intervention programs that would prevent people with mental illness from ending up needing intensive and acute care.

I note, as Senator Webber did, that the government has subsequently made some announcements about increased funding to mental health. However, those promises go only halfway towards meeting the spending increases recommended by the Senate committee report. There is, for example, still inadequate funding to address the chronic shortage of mental health professionals in rural, regional and remote areas of Australia. I was pleased in this context to see that the South Australian government announced in its recent budget an allocation of additional funding in the order of $19.9 million that will enable 56 new mental health workers to be employed in my state.

I would like to take the opportunity to make a few additional comments about the matter of mental health and to highlight a positive mental health story from my state, South Australia. As we sit here tonight, as I speak, a group of nine South Australians and one former South Australian who now lives in the ACT are encamped at a place called Isurava, on the Kokoda Track in Papua New Guinea. Isurava, of course, was the site of a famous and fierce battle fought during August 1942, where Australian soldiers fought heroically despite being massively outnumbered and despite being poorly equipped and exhausted from an already long campaign in a very difficult area of the world.

The group to whom I refer are in the sixth day of a seven-day trek. They are undertaking this arduous adventure to raise money for a respite facility for children with intellectual disabilities. That facility is called Auricht House. It is in the northern suburbs of Adelaide, and it is one of Centacare’s support services. Each year for the last three years Centacare has raised funds—more than $230,000—to supplement the South Australian government funding which enables Centacare to build and run Auricht House. Centacare raises those funds through numerous challenges, including the challenge of walking the Kokoda Track.

For the last two years the Centacare Kokoda trekkers have included amongst their number a gentleman called David Wegmann. He has bipolar disorder, a significant mental illness that used to be known as manic depression. It is a mood disorder characterised by exaggerated mood swings, manifest in extremes of mania and periods of depression. The condition affects a person’s thoughts, feelings, physical health, emotional health, behaviour and day-to-day functioning. It can be extremely disruptive to a person’s life, to their family and to their friends. If left unmanaged, it can unfortunately result in the tragedy of suicide.

Before his illness, David Wegmann worked as a geologist. He is now on a disability support pension. He has a first-class honours degree from Adelaide University and was awarded the very prestigious Tate Memorial Medal for original work in geology. He earned that accolade with a dissertation on the black norite, a kind of granite, found at Black Hill in South Australia. The same norite was, coincidentally, used to build the Australian government funded monument at Isurava on the Kokoda Track. It was a coincidence that Mr Wegmann did not know about until he undertook the incredible feat of accommodating his mental illness while also having to train for, fundraise for and actually walk the Kokoda Track.

It has been an inspiration to all of us who know him to see how Mr Wegmann has overcome what can be a debilitating mental illness, an illness that changed his life. He speaks openly of his illness and entertains us with jokes about bipolar bears and wry observations about the side effects of his medication and the things that can happen if he neglects to take that medication. His frank assessment of his own disability has meant a greater understanding for those of us who walk with him not only about his personal circumstances but about the everyday difficulties that confront others who suffer from mental illnesses such as bipolar disorder.

Apart from walking the Kokoda Track not once but—nearly—twice, ‘Weggers’ has recently started a TAFE course to gain the qualifications to work as community services worker and he has commenced work as a volunteer peer support worker for the Richmond Fellowship, a community service organisation that provides a range of rehabilitation services for people with mental health problems. Mr Wegmann’s enthusiasm for retrieving his life from the disruption of mental illness and then assisting other people to live with their own illness deserves recognition.

The monument at Isurava to which I earlier referred, and which the Centacare trekkers will be camped next to tonight, acknowledges the qualities that the Australian soldiers drew upon to assist each other during the Kokoda campaign. Those qualities—courage, mateship, endurance and sacrifice—apply equally to people like Mr Wegmann who have a potentially debilitating mental illness and who refuse to let it beat them.

Unfortunately, not all mental health stories have happy endings. During Mental Health Week it is timely to again reflect on the need for governments, both state and federal, to ensure adequate resources are made available to help people with mental illness. As we know, one in five Australians will experience a mental illness at some stage of their lives.

The group to whom I referred earlier, including Mr Wegmann, are doing their bit to assist families whose children have mental disorders. I would like to name those 10 persons and commend them on their efforts to walk the Kokoda Track during Mental Health Week and for their contribution to a good news story about mental health. Those people are Joan Schumacher, Anne McDougall, Bernie Victory, Pauline Victory, Tom Warhurst, Chris Warhurst, Professor John Warhurst, Mark Black, Brenton Williamson and ‘Weggers’.