Speaker 1: Kyotra. I'm Chelsea Daniels and this is the Front Page,
Speaker 1: a daily podcast presented by the New Zealand Herald. It's
Speaker 1: no secret New Zealand is suffering a major mental health crisis.
Speaker 1: Some people, including teens and children, often wait weeks to
Speaker 1: see someone when they seek help. It's so dire. A
Speaker 1: survey of those at the cold face of the crisis
Speaker 1: describes a system that's under pressure, under resourced and under
Speaker 1: delivering for New Zealanders. So is there any hope on
Speaker 1: the horizon? With the Coalition government's edition of a specialized
Speaker 1: mental health portfolio Today on the front Page, mental Health
Speaker 1: Minister Matt Doocey is with us to discuss what moves
Speaker 1: are being made to make sure there's help there when
Speaker 1: we need it. Minister, we all know New Zealand has
Speaker 1: something of a mental health crisis at the moment. Hey,
Speaker 1: how bad is it?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 3: Fair to say there's a lot of pressure at the
Speaker 3: moment on our mental health system. We're seeing rising levels
Speaker 3: of unmet need, more people reporting distress and when we
Speaker 3: look at the sector itself, there's a growing number of
Speaker 3: workforce vacancies. So I think largely as a country, we've
Speaker 3: done very well creating a culture where people are facing
Speaker 3: less stigma and discrimination. But I think what's happening now
Speaker 3: as more people are choosing to be more open and
Speaker 3: be more trusting and ask for help, sadly that support
Speaker 3: is not there well.
Speaker 1: The Mental Health and Wellbeing Commissions found fifteen to twenty
Speaker 1: four year olds report the highest level of psychological distress
Speaker 1: of any age. Is that a real concern?
Speaker 3: Yeah, very much so, because when you look at mental health,
Speaker 3: I mean what we should be doing is treating mental illness,
Speaker 3: but also a parallel work stream of promoting better mental
Speaker 3: health and wellbeing. And when we look at the life course,
Speaker 3: it's just vital that we work with young people to
Speaker 3: support them to be mentally well through education and skills
Speaker 3: training so they can assist themselves with the ability to
Speaker 3: manage their mental health and deal with everyday stresses. But
Speaker 3: also for those who go on to develop lifelong and
Speaker 3: enduring mental illness, the adolescent years are vitally important to
Speaker 3: intervene earlier and engage those young people to ensure they
Speaker 3: can get some timely support.
Speaker 1: And we know there's a growing number of teens and
Speaker 1: children waiting weeks, if not months for the help that
Speaker 1: they need. Is this good enough?
Speaker 3: No? No, quite, frankly is not good enough. Look at
Speaker 3: the last government who made quite a big play on
Speaker 3: mental health. They talked about the one point nine billion
Speaker 3: that still today the sector hasn't seen. They've promised to
Speaker 3: transform the sector. Yet the Order to General report that
Speaker 3: was released a couple of months ago showed that waiting
Speaker 3: times for young persons specialist services have actually gone backwards.
Speaker 3: And for me, a large part of that is the
Speaker 3: workforce vacancies. And even in that report, the Orders of
Speaker 3: General stated that there just doesn't appear to be a
Speaker 3: plan to grow the mental health and addiction workforce. So
Speaker 3: we're focused on producing New Zealand's first independent and standalone
Speaker 3: mental health and workforce plan that will be focused on
Speaker 3: driving down vacancy rates in health New Zealand.
Speaker 1: When should we expect to see that plan.
Speaker 3: I'm hoping to get that out in the next month.
Speaker 1: I remember Herald has reported on just one case. It's
Speaker 1: Ryan Aiah Boyd, a thirteen year old girl who is
Speaker 1: believed to have died after struggling with bully. Her aunt's
Speaker 1: I remember wrote an open letter calling for change. What
Speaker 1: would you say to those families in those situations who
Speaker 1: feel that government really isn't doing enough.
Speaker 3: You know, my thoughts and prayers are with that individual
Speaker 3: and family and friends. And as the Mental Health Minister,
Speaker 3: I do meet quite regularly with people who have been
Speaker 3: bereave by suicide, attempted suicide themselves, or been in the
Speaker 3: mental health system over a number of years. And I
Speaker 3: think what we need to ensure is we give people
Speaker 3: timely access to support. And when we're talking about young people,
Speaker 3: we know we have growing levels of unmet need. We
Speaker 3: know the waiting lists are getting longer, and that's why
Speaker 3: for this government, we want to pair up with the
Speaker 3: NGL and community sector because they're a sector that has
Speaker 3: the capacity to grow. We want to get more money
Speaker 3: out of the beehive to the grassroots. So if you
Speaker 3: look at one of the announcements we've made already is
Speaker 3: the twenty four million dollars to gum Boot Friday. That's
Speaker 3: an organization that has several hundred young people specific counselors
Speaker 3: who can provide a level of support within twenty four hours,
Speaker 3: and that investment will support an extra fifteen thousand young
Speaker 3: people accessing that support. And I'm really keen for that
Speaker 3: investment into gum Boot Friday to support young people, specifically
Speaker 3: on waiting lists, because a young person on a weight
Speaker 3: list is quite a red flag to potential risk. And
Speaker 3: also if we can get in earlier, it stops their
Speaker 3: mental health deteriorating further. So we're going to make sure
Speaker 3: we focus on those wait lists.
Speaker 2: For this new money, we can provide even more services
Speaker 2: and more diverse counselors than ever before. We will be
Speaker 2: reporting every single cent every session. If they want to
Speaker 2: report weekly, I will give you a report weekly, so
Speaker 2: we ll be totally transparent.
Speaker 1: What do you make of the backlash from people questioning
Speaker 1: why this one organization got such a large chunk of
Speaker 1: cash while other grassroots agencies say have to go through
Speaker 1: the proper funding channels.
Speaker 3: Well, it was a coalition agreement between the three parties
Speaker 3: of New Zealand First and Act and National to fund
Speaker 3: gum Boot Friday to.
Speaker 1: The tune of twenty four million.
Speaker 3: Though, yeah, it's six million dollars a year over four years,
Speaker 3: isn't it. It shows the level of need to be
Speaker 3: frank and it shows the immediacy that we need to respond.
Speaker 3: Gumboot Friday has a number of young people specific mental
Speaker 3: health counselors that can be deployed and to see people
Speaker 3: within a matter of a day or two, and that's
Speaker 3: what we want to fund. We make no bones about it.
Speaker 3: We want to get the money out of the beehive
Speaker 3: to the grass roots and scale up organizations that have
Speaker 3: facity to deliver, and that's what gun Boot Friday can offer. Also,
Speaker 3: recently we announce the ten million dollar Innovation Fund that
Speaker 3: will pair up with other NGOs to co fund them
Speaker 3: to scale up as well. So it shows the direction
Speaker 3: of travel for this government. We're serious about it and
Speaker 3: we're ready to back organizations who can scale up and deliver.
Speaker 1: What results has gun Boot Friday had that make it
Speaker 1: worthy of such a huge injection of cash and do
Speaker 1: they have the capacity to basically be the government's endorsed
Speaker 1: charitable service at this point.
Speaker 3: Well, what we're looking for within organizations is the ability
Speaker 3: for them to scale up. When you look at gun
Speaker 3: Boot Friday specifically, they have a large number of workforce
Speaker 3: that they can deploy, and when you look at the
Speaker 3: publicly funded mental health system, it is constrained, and part
Speaker 3: of that constraint is the existing workforce in the mental
Speaker 3: health system. So we want to back enngo and community
Speaker 3: groups who can support the publicly funded mental health system
Speaker 3: take some of the demand away from it. And when
Speaker 3: you look at specifically Gumboot Friday, they can evidence a
Speaker 3: social return on investment. And that is similar to our
Speaker 3: Innovation Fund, where we're looking for NGOs and community organizations
Speaker 3: to evidence a social return on investment that shows their
Speaker 3: delivering and their effective.
Speaker 1: You've already mentioned Labour's one point nine billion dollar investment
Speaker 1: in mental health? Did that make any difference at all?
Speaker 1: And now we have mental health targets, right, will that
Speaker 1: ensure that we actually start to see that bang we're
Speaker 1: getting for our buck in the mental health space.
Speaker 3: Well, what Labor did prove in the last two terms
Speaker 3: was actually money isn't the sole answer and solution to
Speaker 3: dealing with the issues in mental health. And to answer
Speaker 3: your question when you said did it make a difference, well,
Speaker 3: even the Independent Mental Health and Wellbeing Commissioned said they
Speaker 3: couldn't find any evidence of that investment making a difference
Speaker 3: and they actually called for a plan. So beggars belief
Speaker 3: that a lot of money was promised, We're not sure
Speaker 3: where it went and there was actually no plan and
Speaker 3: what we want to do is ensure that when we
Speaker 3: make investment into mental health, but into other areas as well,
Speaker 3: that a government spends money on to ensure that we
Speaker 3: a hold ourselves accountable. Is a government to where that
Speaker 3: tax byer money has been invested into, but ensure we
Speaker 3: get results. So look a part of my new role
Speaker 3: of New Zealand's first Mental Health Minister and look to
Speaker 3: be very candid. Just giving someone a job doesn't make
Speaker 3: a difference. Nothing's changed because there's a new person in
Speaker 3: a job. But clearly what I choose to do with
Speaker 3: this role to how it helps support better mental health
Speaker 3: is what I will be held to account over the
Speaker 3: next few years. But part of my role is to
Speaker 3: be responsible for the mental health and addiction ring fence
Speaker 3: funding in New Zealand. That's a two point six billion
Speaker 3: dollars spend every year and I want to ensure that
Speaker 3: that's delivering. So last week with the Prime Minister Christopher Luxen,
Speaker 3: we announced five targets that are focused on access eighty
Speaker 3: percent of people to be seen in specialist services within
Speaker 3: three weeks, eighty percent to be seen by primary mental
Speaker 3: health services in one week, as well as committing to
Speaker 3: train an extra five hundred mental health professionals a year
Speaker 3: out of baseline funding and to focus on prevention and
Speaker 3: early intervention through committing to spending twenty five percent of
Speaker 3: that ring fence funding on prevention early intervention.
Speaker 4: We all know people are waiting weeks, if not months,
Speaker 4: to see a counselor they're often no bed or no
Speaker 4: facilities or nowhere for parents to turn to. We want
Speaker 4: targets because it actually focuses our ministers and our government.
Speaker 4: It also focuses very much our public service.
Speaker 1: In terms of those targets, will we get a good
Speaker 1: look what will there be monthly stats? Quarterly?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think we'll start off with quarterly. I'm happy
Speaker 3: to move to monthly if it shows that that will
Speaker 3: further support performance and accountability for me. Looking at those targets,
Speaker 3: there'll be a need in some areas because they're new
Speaker 3: to set up the data capture, reporting and quality. But
Speaker 3: ultimately what we want to see is a clear line
Speaker 3: of sight around accountability and performance as well. So when
Speaker 3: you look at the target of eighty percent of people
Speaker 3: been seen within three weeks for specialist services from the
Speaker 3: data we capture at the moment, which is definitely not complete.
Speaker 3: We might be sitting around seventy five five percent, but
Speaker 3: actually when you look at young people, we're probably sitting
Speaker 3: closer to around sixty six percent, And not that we're
Speaker 3: measuring it at the moment, but I'm sure if you
Speaker 3: were to look at MARDI or maybe people living in
Speaker 3: rural communities, that would be well below the benchmark of
Speaker 3: eighty percent as well. So it gives us ability to
Speaker 3: get visibility over a range of groups and priority groups
Speaker 3: and groups of people who are on the wrong side
Speaker 3: of mental health and suicide statistics to ensure that they
Speaker 3: can access the support they need.
Speaker 1: And you mentioned staff for we know that staff vacancy
Speaker 1: rates have doubled since twenty eighteen. What can actually be
Speaker 1: done to get more workers in the mental health sector?
Speaker 3: Yeah, well, I think this is primarily one of the
Speaker 3: key areas where the last government fell over on. I
Speaker 3: think as a minister it might be the easier part
Speaker 3: of announcing money, but the difficult part is turning that
Speaker 3: investment into new services on the ground. And you can
Speaker 3: announce money, but if you don't have the workforce to deploy,
Speaker 3: those services will never open. In fact, last year there
Speaker 3: was an impatient facility that closed down here in Canterbury
Speaker 3: through lack of staffing, and even an adolescent mental health
Speaker 3: service I visited in Wellington a few months ago had
Speaker 3: a fifty percent workforce vacancy rate, so there's no surprise
Speaker 3: people were stuck on waiting lists and unable to access
Speaker 3: the support. So for me, it's twofold. We need to
Speaker 3: look at our current training pipelines for mental health professionals.
Speaker 3: So if you look at something like clinical psychology, the
Speaker 3: advice I've got is we need around two hundred to
Speaker 3: two hundred and fifty more clinical psychologists a year, but
Speaker 3: currently our pipeline only trains fifty. But when you actually
Speaker 3: dig into the data, what it also shows is about
Speaker 3: four hundred people who graduate with undergraduate psychology degrees every
Speaker 3: year in New Zealand, but when they miss out on
Speaker 3: one of those fifty internship plays, they disappear from the sector.
Speaker 3: So we want to do some new stuff as well.
Speaker 3: I'm looking at a new registration of an associate psychology
Speaker 3: role where we can look at giving those people a
Speaker 3: new registration and a new route into the field, and
Speaker 3: I think that's quite exciting.
Speaker 1: Would that be kind of like becoming a teacherade or
Speaker 1: something in the classroom.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's based on the UK model. It's been very
Speaker 3: successful over there. I had the fortunate experience of working
Speaker 3: for the NHS in London for over ten years and
Speaker 3: fear to say quite a lot of comparable countries are
Speaker 3: grappling with the same issues. So it would be for
Speaker 3: someone to be coming in at an associate level to
Speaker 3: have an agreed scope to acknowledge that where they are
Speaker 3: at that point of time and their profession, and it
Speaker 3: gives them an ability to train in their role as
Speaker 3: well to maybe go on to be a clinical psychologist.
Speaker 3: And I think what we want to do is make
Speaker 3: sure that we open up the exhibit sting pipelines of
Speaker 3: training we have in New Zealand, but actually think quite
Speaker 3: differently about new registrations. Another area I'm queen keen to
Speaker 3: expand is the peer support and lived experience workforce, hugely
Speaker 3: underutilized in New Zealand. I've recently announced a one million
Speaker 3: dollar fund to allow more people to get the level
Speaker 3: for certification to achieve those roles, but also a new
Speaker 3: service of peer support and lived experience workers in ED
Speaker 3: departments across New Zealand to provide timely support as well.
Speaker 3: So I think we've got to pull all the levers
Speaker 3: and that comes back to this mental health and addiction
Speaker 3: workforce plan that we have not had, and we will
Speaker 3: produce that in the coming months.
Speaker 1: Well, I mean, speaking of data, one in five New
Speaker 1: Zealanders experience mental illness in their lifetime in prison. These
Speaker 1: figures are significantly higher, more than nine out of TAN,
Speaker 1: So that's ninety one percent of people in prison have
Speaker 1: had a lifetime diagnosis of a mental health or substance
Speaker 1: abuse disorder. That's shocking, isn't it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, significantly high rates, which I would probably say are
Speaker 3: significantly under reported as well. There isn't consistent screening and
Speaker 3: assessment tools used for our prisoners. Recently, the government's move
Speaker 3: to change the settings to allow RAMAND prisoners because they
Speaker 3: a growing population within our prisons and our correction facilities
Speaker 3: at the moment, to access rehabilitation programs, including mental health
Speaker 3: and addiction services. Before they were unable to do that
Speaker 3: because they were on romand as well. But I fundamentally
Speaker 3: believe it's right for if someone meets a threshold of
Speaker 3: incarceration to keep the community. But it's actually also incumbent
Speaker 3: of the government of the day to ensure that why
Speaker 3: the person is in prison, we ensure that we can
Speaker 3: support them to the best of our abilities with rehabilitation programs,
Speaker 3: including mental health and addiction services, to ensure that when
Speaker 3: they are released, they do reintegrate back into society and
Speaker 3: they're not looking to re offend and come back into prison.
Speaker 3: So a key part of this new role is New
Speaker 3: Zealand's first Mental Health Minister is not only to manage
Speaker 3: the two point six billion ring fence funding for mental
Speaker 3: health and addictions, but to work together with my colleagues
Speaker 3: around the cabinet table to develop in all of government strategies.
Speaker 3: So what are we doing in education, what are we
Speaker 3: doing in prisons, in housing and social services and the like,
Speaker 3: to ensure that we're connecting up all the mental health
Speaker 3: support across the government departments.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so more does need to be done, hey, in prisons.
Speaker 1: When it comes to mental health support, I think.
Speaker 3: There's a lot we can do. There's a growing area
Speaker 3: of work now around neurodiversity as well, not specifically a
Speaker 3: mental health condition, but I think with the ability now
Speaker 3: to screen, assess and help people get better support, I
Speaker 3: think it's the way forward because the government's committed on
Speaker 3: reducing offending and also recidivism in crime, especially youth crime,
Speaker 3: and I think mental health support and addiction support will
Speaker 3: keep part of that.
Speaker 1: Is your government committed to making it easier for people
Speaker 1: to get diagnosed and treated for those neurodiversity conditions.
Speaker 3: Yeah, We're possible. And I think it links back into
Speaker 3: the conversation we've had around workforce and potentially looking at
Speaker 3: the scope of practices for some of our workforce professions.
Speaker 3: A good example is the work and in fairness it's
Speaker 3: my colleague across Ile, Chloe Strawbrick from the Greens who's
Speaker 3: leading a lot of this work and look, I want
Speaker 3: to take a bipartisan approach to mental health.
Speaker 5: For kiwi's living with ADHD, including some of the most recognizable.
Speaker 5: A diagnosis can be life changing, but hope is on
Speaker 5: the horizon. Swarwick chairs Parliament's Cross party Mental Health Group
Speaker 5: and says there is now a consensus on two critical changes.
Speaker 6: The ability for GPS to prescribe, which can happen in
Speaker 6: a matter of months if pharmac prioritizes that and ministers
Speaker 6: see to that. And the second is a review of
Speaker 6: the special authority process which is currently a massive roadblock
Speaker 6: that requires those with ADHD to go back to their
Speaker 6: psychiatrists every two years to showcase that their brain has
Speaker 6: in fact not dramatically altered misself.
Speaker 3: Chloe from the Greens and the whistle Wall from Labor
Speaker 3: at the time set up New Zealand Parliament's first cross
Speaker 3: party Mental Health Group, and I really want to make
Speaker 3: some enduring changes that will go past the three year
Speaker 3: parliamentary cycle. And some of the work we're doing that
Speaker 3: Chloe has been leading as well around ADHD is understanding
Speaker 3: whether it needs to be a psychiatrist that signs off
Speaker 3: the spe authority prescribing or some of the assessments. And
Speaker 3: when we look at that and maybe start to think,
Speaker 3: is there other medical professions that can pick some of
Speaker 3: that work up to free up more capacity within psychiatry,
Speaker 3: because part of their short at the moment with the
Speaker 3: competing priorities is that someone who's perceived has been stable
Speaker 3: but needing neurodiverse assessment might be not as prioritized as
Speaker 3: someone in a mental health condition and crisis. Hence the
Speaker 3: person looking for an ADHD assessment might have to wait
Speaker 3: two years. And so I think that piece of work
Speaker 3: is quite exciting where we look about who's currently delivering
Speaker 3: that scope and where else that might sit. And I
Speaker 3: think that will free up capacity in our workforce as well.
Speaker 1: And should there be a separate mental health option when
Speaker 1: people call one one one? We know mental health call
Speaker 1: outs are taking a huge chunk of police time and resource. Hey,
Speaker 1: what's the solution here?
Speaker 3: Yeah? Well it's interesting because I've asked me a few
Speaker 3: years ago, I would have had a slightly different answer.
Speaker 3: And why I mean that is the last National government
Speaker 3: in twenty seventeen announced a Mental Health Coresponse Team which
Speaker 3: paired up police and mental health professionals, but sadly the
Speaker 3: incoming Labor government in twenty eighteen canceled that. So we've
Speaker 3: lost six years of work where we potentially could be
Speaker 3: developing better models of response to mental health crisis. I
Speaker 3: think mental health crisis is something that we need to
Speaker 3: do a lot better in New Zealand. But the work
Speaker 3: is becoming very interesting because what the data is showing
Speaker 3: as we look in to the Triple one calls that
Speaker 3: police are responding to, is there a number of calls
Speaker 3: of people who are calling up around issues like loneliness, grief,
Speaker 3: potentially financial issues, relationship issues, and they're very important issues
Speaker 3: for the person, but not necessarily a call through one
Speaker 3: one one that would trigger a police response or a
Speaker 3: mental health crisis call out response. So look, I think
Speaker 3: it's about time we looked at the dispatch center. I've
Speaker 3: been quite open. I do think it's time we have
Speaker 3: a fourth option where you ring up and say police, ambulance, fire,
Speaker 3: or mental health. But then we need to look at
Speaker 3: who would potentially respond to that call if it's a
Speaker 3: threat to the individual or someone else. Could be a
Speaker 3: police response, it could be paired up with mental health
Speaker 3: in the co response teams, or it could be mental
Speaker 3: health teams on their own, or another agency approach if
Speaker 3: it's appropriate. And then from there, I think we also
Speaker 3: need to think about where is the best place to
Speaker 3: take that person. And I know there's some new work
Speaker 3: evolving around the country about what's called crisis cafes where
Speaker 3: people are taken to a crisis cafe manned by support
Speaker 3: and lived experience workers. And there some work around the
Speaker 3: country where parts of emergency departments are fitted out so
Speaker 3: they're more appropriate for someone coming in crisis, so they're
Speaker 3: not brightly lit. A lot of people with noisy as well.
Speaker 3: So that piece of work is going to be three
Speaker 3: to five years. I've got to report back with Mark Mitchell,
Speaker 3: the Police Minister, in November to Cabinet to give an
Speaker 3: update and a plan over the next few years how
Speaker 3: we'll take that forward. Because I want to finish saying
Speaker 3: how lucky we are to have the New Zealand Police
Speaker 3: who respond to mental health crisis callouts, because as we've
Speaker 3: seen in the UK, the Metropolitan Police have started to
Speaker 3: stop responding to mental health crisis callouts and we don't
Speaker 3: want to be in that position, so we need to
Speaker 3: ensure we've got the workforce to respond.
Speaker 1: And lastly, minutes, so you've got quite a bit of
Speaker 1: work ahead of you. There's two and a half years
Speaker 1: until the next election and there's a lot to be done.
Speaker 1: Like you mentioned, that is the possible ability of another
Speaker 1: government coming in and scrapping things, right. Are you prepared
Speaker 1: to work across Parliament on bipartisan deals that will make
Speaker 1: sure that some of these plans will actually survive subsequent governments?
Speaker 3: Very much so. I'm a consensus politician. I look to
Speaker 3: work and in ways that are enduring change. If that
Speaker 3: requires me to compromise or concede at times. I'm prepared
Speaker 3: to do that because what I want to ensure is
Speaker 3: we do have long term change to address the mental
Speaker 3: health issues in this country. One of the successes I
Speaker 3: think in my role as a Mental Health Minister is
Speaker 3: that when there is a change of government, however long
Speaker 3: that takes, the incoming government looks at what change we
Speaker 3: made with this new role and decides to continue with it.
Speaker 3: And I am committed to taking a bipartisan approach. I've
Speaker 3: already met with the Cross part Mental Health Group to
Speaker 3: add my support to what they are doing. As the
Speaker 3: new minister, I'm actually the first minister to meet with
Speaker 3: that group. Is no labor minister meet with them in
Speaker 3: the last two terms, and I'm committed to working with
Speaker 3: them and whoever else wants to work collaboratively in mental
Speaker 3: health within Parliament because that's where I think the change
Speaker 3: will happen.
Speaker 1: Thanks for joining us, Minister. That said, for this episode
Speaker 1: of the Front Page, you can read more about today's
Speaker 1: stories and extensive news coverage at enzat Herald dot co
Speaker 1: dot z. The Front Page is produced by Ethan Sells
Speaker 1: with sound engineer Patti Fox. I'm Chelsea Daniels subscribe to
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Speaker 1: and tune in tomorrow for another look behind the headlines.