Page 3060 - Week 07 - Thursday, 30 June 2011
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The Minister for Health stated in the estimates hearings that mental health made up about 7.9 per cent of the total health budget and that the non-government sector was 14.2 per cent of that. I am waiting to see how much will be spent on capital and recurrent funds and also hope to soon receive answers to my questions on notice regarding these issues.
Mr Hanson has already raised the forensic mental health unit. The forensic mental health unit is an acute project for which there is a dire need. Mental health organisations have been calling for this facility for a number of years. It was incredibly disappointing to see ACT Health remove funding that was allocated to progress this project.
I understand that the government put a hold on the project, as has already been discussed today in the chamber, because of the $30 million cost estimate to build the unit. I would argue that you need to consider the cost to the community of not having this facility and having people inappropriately sentenced to the AMC when they just should not be there.
I do not accept the suggestion from the government that the ACT does not need a secure mental health unit, or that the need is not there, I should say, and that there is not demand. To quote the 2004 feasibility study conducted by the Victorian Institute of Forensic Mental Health:
From the range of consultations and the background material provided to us, it was clear that there is a well defined need within the ACT to contain and ‘treat’ mentally disordered people who are involved in the criminal justice system.
The study also noted that, at a minimum, 10 to 15 beds were needed—most likely 15 beds—if the stand-alone unit was built. We know anecdotally that there are people currently within the AMC with major mental health issues who require specialised treatment and that the AMC is essentially not equipped to be able to provide that specialised treatment on the level that is needed. I note that the estimates committee recommended that the ACT government provide a time line for the completion of the promised secure mental health facility, and I support that recommendation.
I would also like to refer the Assembly to statements by the Tasmanian government about the Wilfred Lopes Centre, a secure mental health unit that government established in 2006:
Most people with mental illnesses do not commit crimes. But when someone who is seriously mentally ill does commit a crime, Tasmania is not made safer by locking them in prison and then releasing them back into the community with their mental illness inadequately treated. We make Tasmania safer by providing professional and highly specialised mental health treatment in an appropriate and secure health setting so that their condition is well managed before they are discharged.
Another point that warrants the development of a secure mental health unit in the ACT is the recent Hamburger review of the AMC and the concerns about the crisis support unit. The unit required review, according to the Hamburger report.
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