Page 214 - Week 01 - Thursday, 11 February 2016
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herself could not cope mentally with waiting any longer and she was melting down quite severely in the emergency area. I think we all have to ask ourselves the question: even though there are services in Canberra, how can that be happening?
Another parent told me, “Our experience of mental health has been for the most part pretty appalling. We have tried to navigate our way through the public health system. Our experience was not a good one. Overwhelmingly, it is painfully obvious that there is a real problem in this town.” Another parent said, “Things are not improving in the ACT and there are particular barriers to assessing effective treatments here.”
I have also spoken to a number of healthcare professionals—nurses and so on—who have also reinforced that, and here are some of their comments: “People think you don’t get a mental illness until adulthood.” I am not saying that is people here in the Assembly but it obviously is something that that healthcare professional has dealt with. “There needs to be investment in nonclinical work” was another comment. “It is important that those suffering with mental health issues are able to seek help when they are in a lucid phase, not when they hit crisis.” I thought that was a pretty useful comment. “Kids don’t know how to have a healthy mind” was the comment of another healthcare professional to me.
I have spoken with several high school principals and teachers who have told me that they are also spending more and more time addressing mental health issues in their students, be it self-harm, depression, anxiety, eating disorders or youth suicide.
Before becoming a member of this place I was involved in research into the sexualisation of young girls and the way that young women are—what is the right word? Suggestions are made in our society about how young women should view themselves and the use of their bodies and the way that their bodies are designed to be, and we have more and more focus on unrealistic expectations and models of existence that are airbrushed and that do not normally exist. I think there is a great deal of misinformation as well in that zone about what our bodies are for and how to be happy with them. That is not directly just a youth suicide matter. That is about self- image. I think in the broader community that is something that lots of people would like to understand how better to deal with. But it can impact on people who are becoming suicidal.
Is the current situation with young people partly a product of busier families or are there a range of causes? Are there things that we could be doing? Do we need to learn about early intervention more? These are all the matters which I would like a select committee to delve into. I think it would be very important also for MLAs in this place to know more and more about this matter so that we are able to delve more into solutions in our policies that we bring forward in coming years. People in this space have told me about the far-reaching impact that suicide has, how there are second and third-order effects within the school community as well as the broader community— not just suicide but attempted suicide as well.
I am not here today to dictate details of how to improve the situation or to pretend that I am an expert. I am here to recommend that we take some next steps. I believe it is time to see established a select committee to thoroughly investigate all the issues and
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