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Legislative Council - Fifty-Second Parliament, Second Session (52-2)
2012-09-05 Daily Xml
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LIFELINE

The Hon. T.A. FRANKS (15:55): I rise today to also discuss the Lifeline organisation, particularly in regard to its existence here in South Australia, and the profound and valuable work it does in tackling suicide and self-harm. This is especially timely, given that this coming Monday, 10 September, is indeed World Suicide Prevention Day. I acknowledge and welcome the fact that both the major parties in this state recently made policy announcements on suicide prevention and, more broadly, on mental health. I welcome the increased openness and willingness not only to speak but to act on this issue, not only making a difference in the community but also similarly making a difference in this council.

I particularly acknowledge the work of the Hon. John Dawkins and his ongoing efforts on this issue. I also commend the Minister for Health and Ageing in the other place for his announcement today and note that both members have seen, quite rightly, the role of non-government organisations and community in empowering all of us as individuals to have a better understanding of how to maintain good mental health and how to assist our friends, our family, our colleagues and our loved ones to also maintain good mental health or to cope with a crisis.

There are many facets to countering and reducing suicide, and one that I particularly want to address today is the role of the organisation Lifeline. I also mention that Out of the Shadows into the Light, an awareness raising memorial walk, is to be held in this city next Monday and around the country, and I encourage any and all of my colleagues to participate.

In 2010, in South Australia 197 suicides took place in our state. This is just under double the number of people killed on the state's roads in the last year, yet we know that suicide is the leading cause of death in Australia for men under 44 and women under 34, and the number of suicide attempts nationally is around 178 a day, or indeed 65,300 a year. The organisation that I pay tribute to today, Lifeline, believes that most of these suicides are preventable and that we all have a role to play.

Lifeline connects people with care by providing crisis support and suicide prevention services. Lifeline is involved in all aspects of suicide prevention across a spectrum of care, including early intervention, continuing care and bereavement support, as well as a range of services, self-help resources, mental health information and a variety of programs specific to the needs of their local communities. Lifeline's 24-hour crisis support line, 13 11 14, offers a confidential, non-judgemental service offered by trained telephone crisis support volunteers. It is Australia-wide, and Lifeline receives over one million contacts every year from help seekers—that is over the phone, on the internet and in person. In fact, there is a new call for help answered by Lifeline every 50 seconds, and that is around 1,400 calls a day across the country.

Here in South Australia, Lifeline has three centres in operation—two are rural, with several offices under each of the regional centres, and one of course in metropolitan Adelaide, which is the largest service in our state. It offers an online crisis support chat service between 8pm and midnight and has over 60 contacts every day. Of these online crisis contacts, 72 per cent are from people under the age of 25 and 57 per cent of those are from rural and remote locations. I understand that the Lifeline Adelaide centre, which is run by Uniting Communities (who many would remember as the former UnitingCare Wesley) took 26,043 calls in 2011 alone, and that is around 70 calls a day.

The work of Lifeline is incredibly beneficial and relies almost entirely on the goodwill of funding from corporates and community through donations, fundraising and partnerships, rather than the government, for the bulk of its activities. It also receives some government funding at the national and state levels, and that goes towards specific programs and services. However, 80 per cent of its operating costs are funded by revenue raised from its retail, book fairs and fundraising activities. There are also 11,000 dedicated volunteers who donate their time and skills to Lifeline to assist others, and around half of those are volunteers who work on that front line, on the telephone crisis support.

They are very highly skilled volunteers; in fact, in Adelaide alone 180 telephone volunteers are trained in Certificate IV in Telephone Counselling. Most of their work will go unheralded, and during the last five minutes while I have spoken we have seen at least six calls taken in that centre. We must all do what we can in this place to ensure that not only are those calls able to be answered but that those calls reduce in number, because we never let people get to the crisis situation where they need to call Lifeline.

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