SALLY BRYANT, ABC RIVERINA PRESENTER: But now, let's get some news around mental health services in our region, because coming to our part of the world later today will be the Assistant Minister for Mental Health and Suicide Prevention and Assistant Minister for Rural and Regional Health, Emma McBride, and joining me on the phone right now. Now, I gather that you have got some announcements to make while you're in our part of the world?
EMMA MCBRIDE, ASSISTANT MINISTER: Sally, good to be with you and very keen to be heading back to the Riverina. We know that distress is increasing in communities and that people deserve quality care close to home. And that's why I'm so pleased to be letting your listeners know that we will be opening two Medicare mental health centres in the Riverina. One is already up and running in a temporary location in Wagga, and we'll have a second one opening in Young. So very pleased to let local people know in the Riverina that there'll be quality mental health services, affordable, much closer to home.
BRYANT: That is very good news. What sort of services are available through these two centres?
MCBRIDE: These two centres will be ones where somebody can walk in, they don't need an appointment, they don't need to wait for a diagnosis, and where they'll get care, free of charge. They'll probably be greeted by a peer worker, someone who's walked in their shoes. They'll also have the opportunity to get care and support through clinicians – perhaps a mental health social worker or a mental health nurse. And importantly, in the Budget, we've had an increase in funding to boost the clinical capability of these centres so that at every centre, there'll be access to a psychologist or psychiatrist on call. We know the long waits that people are experiencing at the moment, or delays to get that expert clinical care. We also know that there's shortages and distribution problems, and a big way of overcoming that and boosting access is making sure that each of these centres – and there'll be 60 right across the country – will have access to expert psychologists and psychiatrists on call.
BRYANT: So how do we go about staffing them? Because the difficulty I'm hearing is that we are having real trouble getting that sort of expertise into regional Australia.
MCBRIDE: And this is a problem that we have faced and that the state and territory governments are also facing in staffing their services. So importantly, this service is jointly funded by the New South Wales Government and the Commonwealth, as part of our bilateral mental health agreement, to make sure that we can use the workforce where it's most needed and going to have the most impact. We also have a national mental health workforce strategy, and in the previous budget, we've invested significantly in growing the pipeline of psychologists and psychiatrists to make sure that there's better access to those expert clinicians, particularly outside of our major cities.
BRYANT: So when we say on call, does this mean the positions won't be based in Wagga or Young, that they'll be coming in from somewhere else?
MCBRIDE: What it will mean is that each of these centres will have a multidisciplinary team. And what that means in practice is that you will be probably greeted by a peer worker, someone who has walked in your shoes. But on site there will be mental health nurses or mental health social workers, so experienced clinicians who work within mental health and wellbeing. Now, if the person then needs more clinical support, then there'll be able to be arranged an appointment for free with an expert psychiatrist or psychologist. Some of them in some of the centres, they already have psychologists and psychiatrists lists that work within the centre. For others, it'll be via video or via the phone. But what we wanted to ensure was that at each centre, anybody who needed the support of a psychiatrist or psychologist would have access to it and for free.
BRYANT: Speaking this morning with Emma McBride, Assistant Minister for Mental Health and Suicide Prevention, and also Rural and Regional Health, and hearing that she's coming to this part of the world and will also be visiting headspace outfits. It's interesting that I hear people talk- in the medical sphere, they talk about how inappropriate and difficult it is for people who have mental health issues to have to front at accident and emergency, that is not ideal.
MCBRIDE: So, here is a headspace service both in, Wagga and in Griffith, and I'll be visiting each of those while I'm there. They've been established for many years in the regions, and what we've made sure in this Budget is that we want to make sure that they've got the right workforce to meet people's needs, particularly if they're in crisis. So we have invested more in what's called the Early Career Program to make sure that clinicians who are developing in their career have the right support around them to be able to provide quality care to young people, and also to be supported as they develop their skills and expertise as clinicians.
BRYANT: So that means that if they're, say, studying somewhere like CSU, that they've got a network around them and that they're getting a sense of what it's going to be like to work in a regional centre.
MCBRIDE: And this program has been rolled out now for more than two years, and what we want to see is consistently that an early career social worker or psychologist has the right kind of supervision and support to be able to provide care to young people, and also to develop the skills that they need. But you're right, with support around them, so that when they are facing a challenging and complex situation, that they have the support and the toolkit that they need to be able to provide that quality care in sometimes difficult situations, and often in crisis.
BRYANT: And that is the nature of working in that mental health sphere, isn't it? And if you're unwell in south-western New South Wales, you can end up in a Victorian hospital. So there is a bit of a slip between cup and lip there, in terms of continuity of care. How can something like that be addressed?
MCBRIDE: And this is why we have a national mental health and suicide prevention agreement and bilateralS that sit under that that really define the roles and responsibilities of the Commonwealth and the states and territories, including for resourcing and the actual operation and delivery of care. And as a former mental health worker myself, and having worked for many years in the state-run public health system, I understand where the gaps are. And we're determined to work very closely with the states and territories to close those gaps, to boost services and to make sure that wherever you live, consistently you can get that quality care much closer to home.
BRYANT: Emma McBride, thanks so much for joining me this morning. That is Emma McBride. She's Assistant Minister for Mental Health and Suicide Prevention, and also Rural and Regional Health, coming to our part of the world over the next couple of days talking about mental- Medicare mental health centres, which are established- well, there is a temporary service already running in Gurwood Street in Wagga Wagga. And a permanent site will open later this year at 235 Baylis Street in Wagga, and also another service which will be opened by the end of the year in Young.