Page 4157 - Week 12 - Thursday, 1 December 2022
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commonwealth government through the Capital Health Network. Headspace has a focus on early intervention and provides support to young people with mental health, physical health, including sexual health, alcohol and other drug services, as well as with work and study support.
Many young people accessing headspace services report that it is their first instance of help-seeking for their mental health concerns. Headspace also provides low to no cost services to young people who access private health and mental health services through a headspace service.
As such, the ACT government was pleased that a second headspace centre opened in 2021, located in Tuggeranong. This is a welcome investment to support the increased accessibility of mental health services for young people across the ACT.
In our bilateral agreement with the commonwealth, they have funded the enhancement of existing headspace services in the ACT. This will help to ensure that these headspace services can meet the growing needs of the young people accessing them.
Canberra Health Services has also been renegotiating the service-level agreement with headspace in Braddon and Tuggeranong to improve service delivery and care coordination between the Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service, CAMHS, and headspace. The new SLA, which is yet to be signed by both parties, offers headspace opportunity for peer consultation with CAMHS to work in partnership to provide a collaborative care approach in assessment, care planning, referral and treatment of young people and their families.
CHS and headspace have committed to exploring opportunities to work more collaboratively, to improve service delivery for young people and their families and ensure more streamlined services for those who move between headspace and CAMHS. CHS and headspace have agreed to share training opportunities. CHS has offered to provide headspace with peer supervision in 2023 to build skills and capacity within headspace—maybe seeking to address some of the workforce challenges that Mr Cocks has rightly identified.
The timing of Mr Pettersson’s motion is welcome, and I look forward to hearing from the Minister for Mental Health early in 2023 on how the government is continuing to work to deliver for young Canberrans, and particularly the young people of Gungahlin.
I commend Mr Pettersson’s motion to the Assembly, and his ongoing commitment to young people’s health in Canberra and to his local community.
MR BRADDOCK (Yerrabi) (3.38): I would like to thank Mr Pettersson for bringing forward this motion, which highlights not only some of the government’s excellent work on mental health but also what remains outstanding, particularly given the rapid expansion of the population of Gungahlin.
In the last census, Gungahlin was home to 87,682 people. This population growth is particularly amongst young people, who, like young people everywhere, are looking for mental health services and support. I applaud the Minister for Mental Health for
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