Mentally Fit Eyre Peninsula

Mr TELFER (Flinders) (15:15): I rise today to speak on the challenge of mental health awareness and the good work that is being done in my electorate of Flinders by the hardworking team at Mentally Fit Eyre Peninsula. Mentally Fit EP was created by community members in 2014 to change negative communication about mental illness and advance skills in mental health to support others in the community.

Under the umbrella of West Coast Youth and Community Support, the program was envisioned and driven by two special people in particular: Jo Clark and Kirsty Traeger. Kirsty was someone I knew from when we were young who had experienced her own challenges with mental health. This drove her to help others with similar experiences in our community. Less than a month after travelling to Adelaide to accept the South Australian Event of the Year Award for Port Lincoln's 2015 Mental Health Week activities, passionate mental health campaigner Kirsty Traeger tragically died in a car crash.

While this tragic event could have potentially meant the end of the vision that Kirsty began, her family, friends and the Eyre Peninsula community instead made sure that her legacy continued. With the passion of Jo Clark added to by other community members, such as Lain Montgomerie, Emma Gale, and Kirsty's husband, Michael Traeger, Mentally Fit EP continues to do amazing things in the Eyre Peninsula community.

Mentally Fit EP began in 2014 with a collective vision to flip mental illness on its head, to create conversation about mental health and to stop focusing on the negative. The program empowers people to take charge of their lives by educating, reducing stigma and upskilling community members, which is done through workshops, community groups, guest speaking roles, courses, events and campaigns. It aims to reach the community of Eyre Peninsula across a distance of 170,000 square kilometres and nearly 59,000 people.

I thought it was especially important for me to recognise both the historic and the current work of Mentally Fit EP this week, which has marked the end of Mental Health Awareness Month here in South Australia. I was privileged to be at the Mentally Fit EP gala ball last weekend, which is the most significant fundraiser event for the organisation. I was very pleased to be joined in my electorate by the member for Elder for the evening at the event, which was well attended and supported by the Eyre Peninsula community.

The event was MC'd by Marc Ryan, known as The Beautiful Bogan, who is an entertaining comedian with a passion for normalising the conversation around mental health and letting men, in particular, know they are not alone in their struggle. The guest speaker was former AFL and current SANFL star Dan Menzel, who shared with the audience about the struggles of life as a professional footballer, the physical and mental pain caused by needing four knee reconstructions and the need for resilience and support to overcome setbacks and adversity in all areas of life.

The Mentally Fit EP gala ball is one of the most significant fundraiser events for the organisation, with generous donations from supporters being auctioned on the night to equally generous bidders in the crowd. The funds raised on the night are added to other community-raised funds, but the program is largely delivered through the generous funding of the Community Banks in Cummins and Port Lincoln, which have pumped hundreds of thousands of dollars into the initiative. Just imagine what a community-driven and supported organisation like this could do with some state government support.

Congratulations to Lain Montgomerie, Emma Gale and the whole Mentally Fit EP team for a well-run, very special event that reminded us all about the importance of mental health awareness and action. Wellbeing and mental health are major concerns for regional South Australian communities like mine, with accessibility to services also being diminished.

Unfortunately, we continue to see regional communities like mine impacted by increasing levels of suicide, with young people tragically making up a significant proportion of these numbers. We all know someone who has made the tragic decision to take their own life and the families, friends and communities that are impacted. Regional communities, in particular, have connections all throughout them.

I want to finish with this message of encouragement to anyone who is struggling in our community: do not go it alone. Please reach out for help. There are people and organisations across our state, like Mentally Fit EP, Lifeline, Kids Helpline and the like, who are able to help you get through your darkest days.