Archived Media Releases: 9 February 2006

Unions seek more mental health funding at COAG

Australia's police and health unions have joined together to call for additional funding for mental health services to be agreed on at tomorrow's COAG meeting in Canberra.

The Police Federation of Australia, the Health Services Union and the Australian Nursing Federation said yesterday that COAG must not be another "talkfest" and there needed to be commitments from the State and the Commonwealth to tackle the shortfall in mental health services.

The chief executive officer of the PFA, Mark Burgess, said police around the country were being put in danger due to a lack of adequate access to acute and community care for the mentally ill, an inappropriate reliance on the police to transport acutely ill people and a lack of proper security in hospitals.

"Too many police have been killed or seriously injured dealing with people with a mental illness.

"There is a lack of services and that means in far too many cases people are being released from acute care facilities straight into the path of police,” he said.

HSU national secretary Craig Thomson said a national workforce strategy needed to be agreed upon as part of any package to tackle the mental health crisis.

"We have an ageing workforce and there needs to be far greater emphasis on recruitment and training across the country," he said.

"In some states the lack of appropriate staff is stopping the expansion of acute care beds which are desperately needed."

Assistant federal secretary of the ANF Ged Kearney said people with a mental illness have a right to be cared for by appropriately skilled professionals. “There is a general lack of understanding on the part of our politicians and policy makers that someone with an acute mental illness requires just as much specialised care as someone injured in a car accident. There is a desperate need for more mental health community based facilities accessible twenty four hours a day, and more mental health professionals, particularly nurses, to provide the support the police and people with mental health problems need.”

Media Contacts
Jill Iliffe, Federal Secretary 0419 576 590
Ged Kearney, Assistant Federal Secretary 0417 053 322
Lani Stanistreet, Manager Communication & Journals 0414 471 339

The ANF, representing 145,000 members, is the professional and industrial voice for nurses in Australia.