Mike King discussed the latest suicide rates and made a tearful plea to improve New Zealand's mental health services. Photo / The Morning Rumble
Mike King discussed the latest suicide rates and made a tearful plea to improve New Zealand's mental health services. Photo / The Morning Rumble
Warning: This article is about suicide and may be distressing for some readers.
Mental health advocate Mike King says he is tired of online “virtue signallers”, politicians, and “arrogant bureaucrats” failing to help New Zealanders struggling with their wellbeing.
In a tearful interview, King, who made his name as a comedian before revealing he suffered from depression and drug addiction and began campaigning for improvements to mental health care, spoke about New Zealand’s suicide rates in what he described as a “f**ked up” system.
“If you put your faith in the system, there is a better than evens chance that your child will die because no one is coming,” the I Am Hope founder told music radio station The Rock.
King, who started the Newstalk ZB radio show The Nutters Club in 2009 to talk about mental health issues, feared more Kiwis would become suicide victims while “arrogant bureaucrats” and members of parliament did little to address long-standing problems.
“We can either sit around and whinge about it or we can do one of two things. Invest in our own system, which is Gumboot Friday, and if you can’t invest, stop being silent. You need to speak up about this,” he said.
Last year, King criticised the Ministry of Health for rejecting a plea for funding from Gumboot Friday, which provides free counselling for young people in New Zealand.
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern later announced the Government would give Gumboot Friday $600,000, which came from the $1.2 million Mental Wellbeing Innovation Fund.
“We cannot let the bureaucrats that run this country - and this is not a political thing. If you think that when National gets in, things are going to be different, you’re living in la la land,” King said.
Mental health advocates have often criticised a lack of access to mental health services. In October, Te Whatu Ora figures showed the public system was short of 643 mental health staff.
For the past eight months, the Herald has run an editorial campaign called Great Minds, which has investigated and highlighted the alarming rise in mental health problems among children and teenagers, and the lack of services and support available for them.
Wiping back tears during the radio interview, King also hit out at online “virtue signallers”.
“I’m sick and tired of people coming up to me saying ‘I love you post, Mike’. The post I wrote about the mum whose child is dying, whose child is dead. You love that post?” King said.
“You’re not meant to love these posts ... You’re meant to be hurt by these posts, you’re meant to be scared by these posts, you are meant to be horrified, you are meant to be angry.
“Stop being silent and leaving it for other people to do it because other people are tired. I’m tired of leaving my home on the f**king weekend and having my wife crying because I’m not home,” he said as his voice broke.
King said the country’s mental health system still needed significant improvements.
“I hear parents talking all the time about kids leaving their socks on the floor, or dishes in the sink - there are hundreds of families out there who would give anything for their kids’ socks to be on the floor.”
Mike King during a press conference in 2019, after the Government announced a Suicide Prevention Office will be established to coordinate action already underway to reduce New Zealand's historically high rate of suicide. Photo / Mark Mitchell
King’s Gumboot Friday is an initiative by I Am Hope which raises funds for a free counselling service for children and young people.
Fundraisers will be organising events this Friday, with all proceeds going towards connecting kids with counsellors. People can also donate directly to the cause by visiting the Gumboot Friday website or $3 by texting Boots to 469.
According to Gumboot Friday, past fundraising has helped 9300 children access 20,481 counselling sessions.
“Mike and Gumboot Friday literally saved my life, if it wasn’t for those free sessions I would have never found out what was truly wrong with me and how to fix it,” one Gumboot Friday user said.
