Page 2402 - Week 07 - Thursday, 4 August 2022
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video
Children and young people—mental health services
MR BRADDOCK: My question is to the Minister for Mental Health. Minister, I was pleased to see, in the mental health budget announcement, that it included a childhood early intervention team in Gungahlin. Can you please provide some details of that announcement?
MS DAVIDSON: I thank Mr Braddock for the question. We announced $14½ million in funding for child and youth mental health services, including investment in bringing childhood early intervention programs to the child and family centre in Gungahlin. This is really important because making sure that people can get access to care at an earlier stage in their mental health journey and closer to home is a key part of supporting children and their families into a recovery space with their mental health and wellbeing. That is why we have invested $4 million in that CAMHS expansion into Gungahlin. This will help a large number of families to get access to appointments without having to go to Belconnen or Woden. They will be able to go somewhere a little bit closer to home. That will make an enormous difference for them.
MR BRADDOCK: Minister, can you also give details of other mental health budget announcements that you have made in the last week?
MS DAVIDSON: Another important thing, while we are talking about child and family mental health, is the establishment of mother and infant dialectical behavioural therapy. We had a couple of different dialectical behaviour therapy programs in our budget announcements. This is really important because it is a particular type of therapy that has often been very hard to get access to in the ACT. Being able to provide more people with access to this therapy will make a huge difference, not just for those people that are accessing this therapy now, for mother and baby dialectical behaviour therapy, but also for generations to come. It can make a real difference in changing people’s lives and being able to support them in good parenting. That will have an impact on the next generation as well.
Budget—sports infrastructure
MR CAIN: My question is to the Minister for Sport and Recreation. Minister, while the Canberra Liberals welcome the $9.43 million allocated to the new Gungahlin tennis centre in this year’s budget, why is existing sporting infrastructure in Ginninderra—for example, the Hawker tennis centre—being allowed to fall into significant disuse and disrepair?
MS BERRY: It is a privately owned facility.
MR CAIN: Despite this, acknowledging what you have said, an important element of the facility in Hawker is that it is surrounded by a wonderful softball centre and soccer grounds. Why isn’t the government doing something about this neglected site in disrepair?
MS BERRY: It is a privately owned site, so it really is up to the owner of that site as to what their plans are for that. What I can say is that the ACT government has
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video