ADJOURNMENT
Ms McBRIDE (Dobell—Assistant Minister for Mental Health and Suicide Prevention and Assistant Minister for Rural and Regional Health) (13:25): I am so pleased to address the chamber today to speak about something that affects so many individuals and families right across Australia. It's their mental health and wellbeing. In Australia today, two in five young people experience mental health challenges in any 12-month period; for adults, that's one in five.
And, across our lifetimes, about half of us will experience a mental health challenge. That is why, at the last election, our government made the largest investment in mental health and wellbeing of any Commonwealth government—a more than $1.1 billion investment in the mental health and wellbeing of all Australians, bringing care closer to home in communities, and all free under Medicare.
Today, we mark a significant milestone. I want to thank Alicia Payne and her constituent Rachel. Today, at the Medicare Mental Health Centre in Civic, we announced that we have now seen more than 500,000 visits.
More than half a million Australians have now had the chance to be able to walk into a safe and welcoming place where they're greeted with compassion and where support is tailored to their individual needs. In total, nearly 50,000 Australians have now turned to a Medicare Mental Health Centre for free mental health support. Many of them, or most, are presenting for mild anxiety or depression—the most common mental health struggles that Australians experience.
Medicare Mental Health Centres are staffed by multidisciplinary teams: peer workers—people with their own lived experience who can walk alongside someone; and people like me—mental health clinicians. Together, they're providing holistic, wraparound care. Today we're marking more than 500,000 visits.
That is a significant milestone. I think this has happened because we're reducing barriers to care. Someone doesn't need to get a referral from a GP.
They don't need a diagnosis. They don't need to make an appointment. They can walk in and receive care that is tailored to their needs.
I also wanted to mention, from my local constituency, that I was very proud recently to open the new Medicare Mental Health Centre in Tuggerah—and there'll be one opening in Gosford in the coming months. On that day, I was joined by my colleague Oliver, who is now an associate professor of nursing at the University of Canberra. Oliver was a young nurse when I was a fairly new pharmacist working in mental health.
We would often talk about the struggles that people faced, where they ended up either being brought in by ambulance or being brought in by police to the mental health inpatient units where we worked, simply because there wasn't care in the community when they needed it. Now, to have a Medicare Mental Health Centre in Tuggerah, in addition to a headspace in Wyong, a headspace in Lake Haven and a new Kids Hub in Tuggerah as well, means that, whatever stage of life you're in, and whatever your circumstances are, there will be better support for you, free, under Medicare.
On the theme of mental health, I also wanted today to mention and congratulate the Labor Senator from South Australia Marielle Smith. The Senate yesterday supported a new select committee to focus on women's health, and I had the privilege, just before this speech today, of meeting with Senator Smith, who has so courageously shared her own lived experience. Through her role in the Senate, she will now have the opportunity, along with the other members of the select committee, to hear from women across Australia and understand their personal experiences.
That will shape future recommendations and build on the work that we're doing to let people know that, in Australia today, about one in five expectant or new mothers experience perinatal depression or anxiety, as do one in 10 new or expectant fathers. That impacts about 100,000 Australian families each year. This committee's work will obviously have a broader focus on women's health, but the particular part that I'm interested in understanding better through people's own personal experience is: how can we reach people sooner?
How can we improve screening? How can we improve wraparound support, to make sure that any new or expectant parent gets the care and support they need, including for people who live in more regional or remote parts of Australia? We are investing, of course, in perinatal mental health, and opening Gidget Houses across the country.
Marielle had the opportunity to open one in Murray Bridge just last week, and I'll be opening one in Wyoming on the Central Coast of New South Wales tomorrow. So that's a big investment already, but there's more to do. There's an opportunity now to hear directly from women and families, learn from their own lived experience and make sure that what we do improves the lives of all Australians.
Question agreed to. Federation Chamber adjourned at 13:30