Page 4146 - Week 13 - Tuesday, 15 November 2005
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MS PORTER (Ginninderra) (4.23): This government has a clear commitment to improve ACT mental health services, as acknowledged by the Mental Health Council of Australia in the Not for service report. As indicated by Mr Corbell, the ACT government has demonstrated its ongoing commitment to mental health by increasing funding for mental health services in the last three budgets. This increased expenditure has been recognised by any number of internal and external reports.
The National mental health report of 2002 noted the ACT government’s expenditure on mental health services was lagging behind the national average, with a per capita expenditure of $75 in 2000-2001 compared to the national average of $81 per capita. Under the present ACT government, this level of funding has increased significantly and in the ACT’s 2004-2005 budget, handed down on 4 May 2004, the government committed a per capita expenditure of $131.
This government does not have a record of resting on its laurels but has as record of getting on with the job. And the area of mental health is no different. The government is continuing to work hard to improve mental health services in the ACT.
In relation to hospital services, the government is building a psycho-geriatric inpatient unit at the Calvary Hospital campus and is undertaking planning processes to deliver significant and secure mental health inpatient facilities in youth mental health treatment and care. These new inpatient services will reduce pressure on the two public adult inpatient units that currently provide the inpatient services to these populations, that is, older persons and youth, and will be more appropriate, as Mr Corbell said.
Further, the ACT government has recognised that treatment is nothing unless it is coordinated, coordinating all types of care—crisis care, short-term care, long-term care, community care. It is not just about hospital services, as essential as these are.
This government’s investment in community mental health services is a necessary parallel and is complementary to the inpatient units. Also, it is necessary in maintaining people in the community as fully participating members of our society. The ACT is now well ahead of the national average in funding community-based services which assist people to retain their links to work, family and community supports. Around 75 per cent of total mental health funding in the ACT is allocated to community-based services, as Mr Corbell said earlier. The national average is around 51 per cent. The ACT’s commitment is around 75 per cent of total mental health funding.
An excellent example of one such community-based service is the connections volunteer program, which links people living with mental illness with a volunteer who has weekly social contact with that person. This program provides a valuable opportunity for ordinary people in the community to understand the effect of mental illness on individuals and on families, to assist in a very real way to maintain the health of the individual and even, in some instances, to provide respite to the families and carers of people affected by mental illness living in the community. This service is a preventative service—a service in the community to keep people healthy; to keep people healthy in their community, living in their community, and participating on a day-to-day basis in their community life.
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