Talking Point: Government focused on supporting mental health - Katie Nimon

Napier MP Katie Nimon says National has announced five mental health and addiction targets. Photo / Warren Buckland

Katie Nimon is MP for Napier

OPINION

No one is immune to mental health challenges.

As a government we are focused on ensuring that those who are experiencing mental health difficulties are receiving the support that they need.

To hold us accountable on delivering better outcomes we have announced five mental health and addiction targets to provide the focus needed to make progress.

These targets include:

• 80% of people accessing specialist mental health and addiction services to be seen within three weeks.
• 80% of people accessing primary mental health and addiction services through the Access and Choice programme are to be seen within one week.
• 95% of mental health and addiction-related emergency department presentations are admitted, discharged, or transferred from an emergency department within six hours.
• 25% of mental health and addiction investment is to be allocated towards prevention and early intervention.
• And we want to train 500 mental health and addiction professionals each year.

We know there’s a lot of work to do but we are determined to drive improvements in mental health, addiction and suicide prevention outcomes.

Targets provide clear expectations for health system performance and are intended to improve outcomes for people with mental health and addiction needs, as well as supporting people to stay well.

We also know that the Government does not have all of the solutions.

It was great to see the Minister for Mental Health Matt Doocey announce that the first round of the government’s $10 million Mental Health and Addiction Community Sector Innovation Fund will be open for applications later this month. This will offer an opportunity for non-governmental and community organisations to access time-limited government funding.

The fund will support innovative community providers of mental health services to scale up their already successful operations so they can reach more Kiwis.

This announcement supports the Government’s priority focus of increasing access to mental health and addiction support, growing the mental health and addiction workforce, strengthening the focus on prevention and improving the effectiveness of mental health and addiction support.

These organisations are already offering vital services in the mental health and addictions field and this funding reflects that.

Just recently we announced we are funding Gumboot with $24 million over four years which will provide young people aged between 5 and 25 years with free mental health counselling services. This will enable at least 15,000 young New Zealanders to access free mental health counselling services each year.

I was thrilled earlier this year to have my member’s bill drawn. The Pae Ora Healthy Futures Amendment Bill is currently before the Health Select Committee and if enacted the bill will mean the creation of a Mental Health and Wellbeing Strategy, this will provide a framework to guide health entities for the long-term improvement of mental health and addiction outcomes.

I’m really proud of what our government is doing to address the mental health crisis in New Zealand.