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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2004 Week 07 Hansard (Wednesday, 30 June 2004) . . Page.. 3064 ..

In the 2004-05 budget the ACT government allocated an additional $365,000 to suicide prevention activities, including the development of an ACT suicide prevention strategy; $300,000 for the establishment of a community forensic mental health team; and a total of $200,000 for feasibility studies into the provision of a high security mental health care facility, a replacement for the PSU and a child and adolescent inpatient service. We have also commissioned a number of reviews into the status of mental health services in the ACT and ACT Health is working to implement all the recommendations to those reviews aimed at continuing to improve mental health services.

However, of course we are not content to rest on these past improvements. We continue to look to the future and to develop a strong strategic direction for the delivery of mental health services across the whole of the territory. As Ms MacDonald has said, one of the areas requiring our ongoing commitment is that of research into suicide prevention and other mental health issues, to improve our understanding of mental illness and to develop evidence-based programs to ensure the best possible mental health outcomes for the community.

Australian and international research shows that people with mental illness have a higher risk of suicide than the general population. The rate of suicide in the ACT and nationally has remained relatively stable over the past five years, with the most at-risk age group in the whole population being 25 to 39-year-old males.

Although it is useful to refer to mortality statistics, it is important to address the latest evidence in suicide prevention initiatives. Last year the Australian Institute for Suicide Research and Prevention reported that mental health is really only one factor that contributes to suicide risk. The report emphasises the need to increase understanding of the relationship between mental health and suicide and the impact of other risk factors on suicide rates.

This government is, as all members know, committed to the expansion of our knowledge and understanding of suicide and other issues in relation to mental health, to enable us to continue to improve our ability to provide quality mental health care into the future for all Canberrans. It is on that basis that I am more than happy to support Ms MacDonald’s motion in relation to this.

Bearing in mind the progress that has been made by this government, I guess it is with regret as much as anything—not surprise but certainly regret—that I comment on the amendments that have been proposed by members. The motion moved by Ms MacDonald is designed to put before the Assembly the progress that has been made in relation not just to issues around mental health but to suicide prevention and the government’s commitment to putting those issues on the agenda and funding them specifically—that we have developed a mental health strategy into the future. But we have had an attempt to score, really, just fairly cheap political points, noting a lack of progress in a circumstance or an environment where mental health funding has grown enormously in the last 2½ years under this government.

As you would know, Mr Deputy Speaker, the ACT, under the previous government, under the Liberals, funded mental health to a lesser degree than any other jurisdiction in Australia. That is the road we were travelling; that is the mess we inherited; that was the

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