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House of Assembly - Fifty-Fifth Parliament, First Session (55-1)
2025-11-12 Daily Xml
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Motions

World Mental Health Day

Debate resumed.

Ms CLANCY (Elder) (12:43): I rise today to indicate the government's support for this motion, recognising World Mental Health Day, and I thank the member for Schubert for bringing this motion before the house. As the motion rightly points out, the latest national data tells us that just shy of 43 per cent of Australians aged 16 to 85 have experienced a mental health disorder in their life. In South Australia specifically, that equates to roughly two in every five people, or around 564,000 South Australians.

Mental health challenges can be experienced across every age, background and location across our state. South Australians deserve to be able to access the right mental health care at the right time, whether that is a community service, a bed in a hospital or a place where they can walk in and be heard and supported.

We know one of the biggest tasks ahead of us is building and sustaining a skilled mental health workforce. Released in April this year, the SA Psychiatry Workforce Plan provides a long-term strategy to address the shortages the member raises in her motion. The plan was developed in partnership with the Office of the Chief Psychiatrist and the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists.

A steering committee is currently overseeing the implementation of the plan's outcomes, including addressing the projected short to medium-term shortfall with a dedicated workforce surge strategy; increasing the projected growth of the SA psychiatry workforce over the next decade; enabling reskilling and redistribution to critical areas of need through systemic support; modernising working conditions for all psychiatrists, particularly in areas involving workflow and training; and greater coverage that meets rural psychiatry demand, utilising video and teleconferencing services as well as the existing fly-in fly-out services.

SA Health is also responding to critical workforce needs across local health networks by developing a new Mental Health Nurse Transition to Professional Practice Program. The program includes a dedicated early career pathway for graduate nurses to specialise in mental health; structured clinical rotations integrated with postgraduate study towards a graduate certificate in mental health nursing; and a focus on strengthening career pathways, building a sustainable workforce and enhancing mental health care delivery across South Australia. This program will be piloted next year, offering up to 51 graduate nurses a supported entry into mental health nursing.

The Malinauskas government remains committed to increasing the mental health workforce in South Australia. We recently undertook an interstate and international recruitment campaign specifically focused on psychiatry, nursing and allied health. Our campaign targeted overseas and interstate health professionals, aiming to fill existing vacancies and recruit to new positions in the additional mental health services that are currently being established in our state.

We understand the profound impact mental health has on individuals, families and communities. That is why mental health is central to our ambitious health agenda. Since being elected, we have invested $1.7 billion into mental health and will invest $2.5 billion by the end of this term, a 30 per cent increase on what was provided by the former Liberal government. But we all know it is not just about dollar figures: it is about ensuring South Australians have access to the right service when they need it.

The emergency department is not always the right place for someone in crisis. That is why we are opening more alternatives for care, including free walk-in Medicare Mental Health Centres in partnership with the Albanese government. Adding to the existing centre in Adelaide, we have ones in Elizabeth, Mount Barker, Mount Gambier and Port Pirie, with more on the way in Onkaparinga, Marion and Burnside. We have also opened the Safe Haven in Salisbury, a calm community space offering peer-led support. We have supported Lifeline Connect centres in Clare and Port Pirie, and we have opened the Mental Health Alternative Care Service (MHACS), which is also in Port Pirie.

The Malinauskas Labor government has increased funding for community psychosocial programs by 24 per cent. This is in addition to reversing the 19 per cent cut made by those opposite. This funding boost has enabled more than 1,000 extra South Australians a year to receive support through non-government services to assist with their psychosocial mental health needs.

The member for Schubert is right to point out in this motion the unique mental health challenges faced by South Australians in regional and remote communities. These challenges are absolutely compounded where isolation, economic uncertainty and the impacts of climate change are taking a real toll. That is why our government has embedded mental health support within our $73 million drought assistance package, including funding for mental health and resilience programs specifically for drought-affected communities. Farmers, their families and anyone impacted by drought can seek assistance now by calling the PIRSA Recovery Hotline, Medicare Mental Health phone line or, for urgent assistance, the Mental Health Triage.

Preventive Health SA's dedicated website includes information on resources available in an easy to navigate way, and information and support has been provided to PIRSA hotline workers, Family and Business (FaB) Mentors and Rural Business Support counsellors to empower them to directly refer people for mental health support. A dedicated drought industry coordinator will be embedded with ifarmwell, a dedicated non-government organisation whose role it is to connect farmers and primary producers directly with mental health services and resources.

We are also boosting mental health support services to leverage experienced and trusted local mental health providers and farmer-designed mental health tools and supporting the expansion of the Men's Table program to provide safe, peer-supported spaces for men to connect in regional communities. This package is not just about providing counselling. It provides practical, sustainable and flexible support for drought-affected communities over a 12-month period. Referral pathways have been expanded to ensure that if a farmer reaches out for help, they have seamless access to the support they need.

Our government is absolutely committed to supporting rural communities with the services they need to stay strong and connected. We have hired three additional psychiatrists across three regional local health networks, and we have also recruited an additional eight mental health nurses across regional local health networks to deliver specialist mental health services for older people. There is new infrastructure as well, including a new 12-bed mental health ward at the new Mount Barker hospital, the first inpatient unit of its kind in the Adelaide Hills, and a new six-bed subacute ward at Mount Gambier hospital to double their mental health care capacity.

This motion is an important reminder that World Mental Health Day is more than symbolic; it is a call to action, a call to action those of us on this side of the house have heard and began responding to immediately when we came to government. Through record funding, new workforce programs, innovative infrastructure and targeted drought supports, the Malinauskas Labor government is delivering real progress. There are challenges ahead, but we are determined to continue listening to people's lived experience and to clinicians, and to work alongside communities to build a resilient, compassionate and inclusive mental health system for all South Australians.

Mr TELFER (Flinders) (12:51): I rise in support of this motion put forward by the shadow health minister. The shadow regional health minister has spoken so eloquently about the challenges that have been faced, particularly in regional South Australia. I note the different aspects of this motion in particular, firstly, obviously, recognising the importance of World Mental Health Day. Some of the facts and figures within this motion are really important for us to unpack to realise the impacts that they are having in regional South Australia in particular.

The demand within the community in my electorate, which is a long way away from Adelaide, and across regional South Australia for psychiatric services is a really important aspect and one which so many of my community members are bringing to me. It is challenging enough to access a psychologist within regional South Australia let alone trying to get that escalated to a point of being able to see a psychiatrist. This is leaving regional people in particular behind the eight ball when compared with their city cousins.

We had it highlighted to us that the unmet needs within the mental health space in particular that we are facing in South Australia are truly worrying, truly concerning, and something that I believe all South Australians should be casting their attention to because it is something that has been constantly under-resourced, which is sadly having poor outcomes.

The regional experience of mental health difficulties within this motion really does highlight the higher rates that are faced within regional communities and the higher rates of suicide, sadly, that stem from it, compared to our urban areas. Just this morning, I heard from a community member about another sad case within my community. It is something that happens too often.

Wellbeing and mental health care are such major concerns for regional South Australian communities like mine, and my electorate, sadly, continues to see accessibility to services diminished over and over. That is why we are seeing regional communities like mine continuing to be impacted by increasing levels of suicide, continuing to face challenges with accessibility, and continuing to tragically see young people in particular making up a significant proportion of these suicide numbers. It is so important to be able to fund the services that provide those supports, especially within regional South Australia.

I want to recognise the incredible work that some of the groups within my electorate are doing when it comes to mental health awareness. I want to start with the incredible work that has been done by the Mentally Fit EP teams. It has been a subject matter that I have spoken about in this place before because the work that team does is such a prominent part of support within not just Port Lincoln but across the whole of Eyre Peninsula. So much of the support that has been put in place is voluntary. They are always scratching to try to get some level of funding, some level of recognition, whether that is through government, whether that is through external philanthropy or whether it is through sponsorship of businesses.

Mentally Fit EP was created by community members back in 2014 to change that negative communication about mental illness and to equip and advance communities with the skills in mental health support to be able to support others within their community. That was under the umbrella of West Coast Youth and Community Support. As an aside, can I congratulate West Coast Youth on 40 years of service to the community. Next week, they have a special event, which I am very much looking forward to. They are an organisation that does amazing work.

Under that umbrella, the Mentally Fit EP brand was launched and now, over a decade later, they are still doing incredible work. I have spoken about the passion with which it was launched. I will not go into depth again on the vision that Kirsty Traeger had for this support that is community based, stemming from community for community. As decision-makers, as funders, this is something that I believe, in regional centres in particular, we should be leaning into more than ever: having services, knowledge and supports that are driven by local people for local people, based on local needs—not having someone from a health department or from a human services department coming out to regional South Australia and telling people what they need but instead knowing that that decision can be made from the ground up.

The work that Mentally Fit EP has done since 2014 to have that collective vision to flip mental illness on its head, to create conversation about mental health and to stop focusing on the negative, empowers people. It empowers people to take charge of their lives by educating, by reducing stigma and by upskilling community members and the work that they do through workshops, community forums, guest speaking roles, courses, events and campaigns, right across the whole of Eyre Peninsula—and it is a significant footprint.

Only last sitting week when we were here, I had the opportunity to be able to meet with representatives from Mentally Fit EP and to hear that they were successful in their application as part of the Impact100 process, which was a philanthropic group that started with 100 people and has now grown to a few hundred organisations, individuals or businesses that each put a thousand dollars in to fund grassroots delivery of services.

It is a competitive process. They put a presentation together. They did it at a dinner two weeks ago and they were successful in receiving a $100,000 grant, so congratulations to the Mentally Fit EP team. I know that that funding will be multiplied exponentially within my community. It will help Mentally Fit EP expand into more towns, train local leaders and peer facilitators and reach thousands more South Australians with stigma-free, accessible mental health support.

Within regional communities in particular, this is an incredibly important topic. I urge the government to put additional funding into regional South Australia in particular, because without that extra support, sadly, we are seeing regional communities left behind when compared with their city cousins. This is unacceptable. Your outcome should not be based on your postcode. I seek leave to continue my remarks.

Leave granted; debate adjourned.

Sitting suspended from 12:59 to 14:00.

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