EMMA MCBRIDE, ASSISTANT MINISTER FOR MENTAL HEALTH AND SUICIDE PREVENTION: I would like to begin by acknowledging the traditional owners of the land on which we meet and to pay my respects to elders, past and present, and to acknowledge First Nations people here today, and to particularly acknowledged what we have to learn from First Nations people about social and emotional well-being. I'd also like to acknowledge anybody here today with a lived or living experience of mental ill health or those who love and care for them, and for your generous contribution to improving support and care for all people living with mental ill-health around Australia.
I'm so pleased to be joined today by the National Mental Health Consumer Alliance and Mental Health Carers Australia. Many years ago in Australia, we did have the beginnings of what will today be the first national peaks for people with lived experience of mental ill-health. Two separate but related peaks – a peak for consumers, people with their own lived experience and peaks for carers and kin – understanding the separate but related interests of those with lived experience. As a government, we value the input of people with lived and living experience, and we know that the only way that we can improve and continue to lift the systems of mental health support and care are by genuinely listening to and involving people in co-design and co-production, elevating lived experience to decision-making at a national level. And I want to acknowledge all of those who have been involved over decades in contributing their own lived and living experiences as a consumer and as a carer or kin. And I want to recognise, including the work of Mental Health Australia, and the previous consumer forum that is- or the consumer reference group that existed under a former Labor Government.
We value the voice of lived and living experience. We know that it’s through listening to people with their own lived experience, that that is the way that we'll be able to see real change in our systems of mental health support and care. And I am so pleased that today officially to announce the two new peak bodies and the investment of the Commonwealth of $7.5 million in the establishment and the operation of these peak bodies. These two new representative groups will mean that lived experience is at the table, that lived experience is genuinely and deeply involved in an ongoing way in the decisions of government. And we know that will make a really big impact for people, consumers, for carers, for kin right around the country.
I might now hand over to representatives of these two new peak bodies to make their own comments. But I want to finish by saying how important this day is and how significant this day is in the reforms of the Commonwealth working side by side alongside our peak bodies with lived experience so that at national level, we will consistently have the perspectives, the input, and now elevated to decision-making, the perspectives of those with lived experience.
Thank you again to everybody who has been part of today, and thank you in advance for the work that you will do to genuinely improve and change our systems of support and care right around Australia. So I’ll now hand over.
PRISCILLA BRICE, CHAIRPERSON, NATIONAL MENTAL HEALTH CONSUMER ALLIANCE: Hello, I am Priscilla Brice and I am the chairperson of the National Mental Health Consumer Alliance. The alliance is very excited about today's announcement. It's long overdue that people with lived experience of mental health issues get to influence the public policy that affects us. For too long, decisions have been made about us by psychiatrists, medical professionals, and service providers. We hope that today's announcement will change this. We particularly thank those that have fought long and hard beside us and before us for a national peak body. We are standing on the shoulders of giants. This is a key moment for the mental health consumer movement.
We'd like to recognise people with lived experience of mental health challenges across Australia. Your determination to advocate for your rights each day, side by side with us, the peak bodies of mental health consumers. We look forward to working with people with lived experience from across the country to ensure that National Mental Health Policy reflects the needs of mental health consumers. Nothing about us without us. Thank you.
JANET MEAGHER, MENTAL HEALTH ACTIVIST: Hello out there. This is a wonderful, wonderful day and I congratulate the Minister and whoever else has been involved. And there are hundreds and hundreds of us who live with mental health issues and who have all that learning gained by having lived with mental health issues, some of us for a lifetime almost. And we have become experts in what good service provision looks like and experts in ensuring that policies, frameworks, services, and interventions reflect best practise of human rights. And the joy I have in my heart today is shared by so many of us who fought for close on 30 years to see this thing happen today.
I've got to say that after the human rights inquiry into mental illness way back in the dark ages, I think it was finished in 1993, started in 1988, where our voice began to be heard. After that, a small number of us who live with mental health issues decided that we needed an influence nationally. We needed an influence on policies and terms of reference and all the codes of conduct that influence our lives. And here we are today. Oh, count the years. We started an organisation in 17th of September 1996, and it was fantastic. The trouble is governance and what's the nice word? Misappropriation, I think, is the nice word, meant that we were devoiced. And the struggle since then, they've had two iterations of trying to get this happen. And in November 1998, a consortium was trying to get the policies right. Crazed lateral solutions, got all the policies and structures, good co-design process. The Consumer Reference Group was formed in order for us to have that voice fixed so that the governance and the structures were right. And then, we were thwarted again by an organisation that auspice that wonderful initiative, and we've been stuck in that mud since.
There has not been an impetus beyond that. Many of us are damaged by that process, I've got to say. Many of us wanted to walk away. And, now today, I've walked back in and I see our vision and our dreams about our voices being heard with us. And now nothing is about us without us or else.
And I'm hoping that we all work together. This is a lovely moment where there's a wonderful lived experience peak for those with personal lived experience, and we're going to see the family member peak also being acknowledged in a similar way. My heart is full. Our hopes are brimming over. We've got to do it this time. Please give us that voice that lasts. Thank you.
EMMA MCBRIDE: Thank you.
KERRY HAWKINS, VICE CHAIPERSON, MENTAL HEALTH CARERS AUSTRALIA: Hello. I’m Kerry Hawkins, I’m the Vice Chairperson of Mental Health Carers Australia. I'd also just like to acknowledge that we're standing on Ngunnawal Country and pay my respects to Elders past, present and emerging. And particularly, I'd like to note so proudly and happily today the presence of Aunty Vicki McKenna who's from the Indigenous Lived Experience Centre that we have been so privileged to be integrally part of the work that we'll be doing in moving forward. So, thank you for coming all the way from Broome.
I'd also just like to thank, of course, the Minister. This is, as the Family Carer and Kin peak body, we think a world first. It's really quite an innovative investment that we hope reflects the government's, as the Minister has said, investment in and understanding that lived experience - whether it's personal and direct or as a family member of somebody experiencing distress and navigating systems - they're the people that we know we need to shape the system so they actually meet our needs.
As we move forward, I'd also like to acknowledge that as a Family Carer and Kin movement, we stand on the shoulders of giants. And these are people who, again, over decades since the movement around deinstitutionalisation and the failure of a mental health system has created a policy setting that we’ve called Carers, we hope to reclaim our position as families, as kin and make sure that, as we move forward through mental health reform, the needs that we have as family members are recognised by government in terms of how we design policies and programs moving forward. It's long overdue and we are very much looking forward to participating in the transformation of mental health system to meet our needs moving forward. Thank you.
KERRY MCKENNA, HEAD OF ABORIGINAL AND TORRES STRAIT ISLANDER LIVED EXPERIENCE AND THE BLACK DOG INSTITUTE: Hi everyone, Kerry McKenna. I am the head of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Lived Experience and the Black Dog Institute in Sydney. However, I was very excited to come on this journey yesterday to be present. I'm very happy to be present today at the announcement of the new Consumers, Carers, Family and Kin peaks. It's been really impressive to work alongside both of these new organisations, given that they are wanting to do the best to be inclusive of First Nations people and also understand that there are many intersects that comes with that.
For us as Aboriginal people, consumers and carers often doesn't align with our understanding of social and emotional wellbeing, and especially when we consider our responsibilities as family. Often we are caring for family and we ourselves may be consumers. So, both of the organisations have worked closely with us in terms of the- to the processes to coming to this point. So, as the Lived Experience Centre we look forward to this time ahead where we will see that First Nations people are included from the very beginning rather than be an afterthought, so that's exciting for us. And we see that change is going to happen in terms of us being able to speak about the right kind of mental health care and support that our mob needs.
And I do want to say thank you to all of those that we have had the good fortune to work with as part of this process too. And Minister, thank you as well for the acknowledgement. And I'd just like to sign off pretty much by saying thank you to the people for this land that has been home for many and where good decisions are made. It's happy. I'm glad to be an Aboriginal person on this country where all people have really lifted my spirits this morning, So, thank you.
MICHAEL BIRCH, FORMER CHAIR OF NATIONAL CONSUMER NETWORK: Hello. My name is Michael Birch. A very emotional time for me. I was the Chair of the last national consumer network, we were called the Australian Mental Health Consumer Network and I had the misfortune of having to close it down in 2007 because we were defunded. And since that time, myself and many other people have put our heart and soul into trying to get another organisation funded.
And I want to thank especially Mark Butler, who appointed us on a committee several years ago to get another national committee, and then we weren't given the funding again. But I want to congratulate Emma and Mark for finally getting the funding for a national consumer network that we've wanted for so long, consumers have wanted this for so long. I'll leave it at that, I think everything else has been said, before I get really choked up. It's just a very bittersweet moment for me. Thank you.
JENNY LEARMONT, PRESIDENT, MENTAL HEALTH CARERS NEW SOUTH WALES: I have to hold on to this, I'm sorry. Well, where am I looking? I'm Jenny and I'm President of the Mental Health Carers New South Wales, and I have been a carer for over 40 years. So 40 ago I never dreamt I'd be here today where we've seen this wonderful accomplishment that's happened. I'm a great believer in hope, people have often heard me talk about hope, and, as you know, hope often gets dashed down, often does. And as you heard Janet speak, it has many times. Well, now we've got hope today. I hoped we'd have a day like this - that it would happen, and it has happened. And I truly believe now, with the commitment, with so many people here who are all committed to working together, and I know it's going to help consumers, carers, the community, the medical profession, the staff – everybody, this will help everybody because we're all going to be committed to the same thing, we want a better outcome for all. So, thank you very much and I'm so pleased that you've managed to do this. Senator, it's wonderful, and your government, thank you very much.