Wednesday, 5 February 2025

 Emma KEALY (Lowan) (10:18): I rise to speak on the Public Accounts and Estimates Committee (PAEC) 2021–22 and 2022–23 financial and performance outcomes report, which was tabled in March 2024. I would like to reflect upon some of the evidence that was provided and findings and recommendations in the report relating to Victoria’s mental health system.

People within this chamber are well aware that the Royal Commission into Victoria’s Mental Health System provided its interim report in October 2019 and its final report in March 2021. Yet in Victoria, as is evidenced in this report, we are still falling well short when it comes to the provision of mental health care and support in our communities. This is something that is important to me because I care and believe that we can do much better when it comes to supporting people’s mental health in the community, when it comes to ensuring that people can better recognise when their mental health is failing and that as a community we can do more to support one another when we recognise in others that their mental health is a little off, but also we can ensure that there is a workforce available so that people can access mental health support when they need it and where they need it.

I think that is something that should not be an aspiration. It should not just be limited to a royal commission and the many, many, many books and pages – thousands of pages – that were dedicated to what we can do better. We need to make this a commitment as Victorians – not necessarily as parliamentarians, but certainly as Victorians, we must provide a better mental health support system for Victorians who are facing mental health challenges.

Within the PAEC report it does reflect upon the Department of Health’s and Labor government’s failings in delivering key supports for people with mental health needs. I specifically refer to a number of findings in relation to extensive wait times for people suffering mental ill health and mental illness who are languishing in emergency departments across the state because they have been unable to access mental health support in their community. This is reflected by the failure of the Labor government to implement key recommendations in the interim report, which was tabled over five years ago, in relation to workforce. In fact five of the nine recommendations outlined in the interim report were around building a workforce so that when the final report, which was provided 18 months later, in March 2021, was made available we had the workforce there and ready to be able to implement those recommendations quickly.

That was not done. In fact Victoria’s mental health and wellbeing workforce strategy, set down for 2021–24, has largely just sat collecting dust in the top drawer of the minister’s desk. We do not have a current workforce strategy for the Victorian mental health workforce. That is unacceptable when this is the single biggest challenge that we have in reforming Victoria’s mental health system and delivering support to Victorians who need mental health support.

We look at other aspects of the recommendation of the royal commission, particularly those recommendations in relation to reducing the rate of seclusion and restraint. This was an aspiration and a recommendation of the final report – that seclusion and restraint be eliminated within 10 years. We are now four years into the 10-year period, and because the Labor government have not taken action to address workforce issues, many mental health workers are left with no choice, because they do not have sufficient resources to provide the time-intensive support that people require as an alternative to restraint or seclusion. It is government policy and lack of action to develop workforce that is resulting in increasing rates of seclusion and restraint, particularly in younger Victorians.

I also would like to point out recommendation 29, which is around the establishment of Our Agency, the new non-government agency led by people with lived experience. This should have been implemented a year ago. It still has not been funded in the budget. We have a budget coming up very, very soon. I urge the government to get the recommendation timeline back on track to ensure that we are building the workforce that Victorians need and that Victorians can access the mental health support they need – (Time expired)