Queensland election 2024: LNP pledges $50m for mental health units

The LNP will spend $50m on building two short-stay mental health units to help young Queenslanders suffering from anxiety, depression and eating disorders.

Opposition Leader David Crisafulli speaks to the media at The Family Practice Emu Park. Picture: Liam Kidston.

The LNP will spend $50m on building two short-stay mental health units to help young Queenslanders suffering from anxiety, depression and eating disorders.

The two Step Up Step Down clinics will cost up to $25m each to construct and staff, with one to be based in Rockhampton.

Opposition Leader David Crisafulli made the announcement at the Emu Park Family Practice in Brittany Laugua’s Keppel electorate - a key seat eyed by Pauline Hanson’s One Nation.

Each facility would include just six beds, but Mr Crisafulli said it would be a significant addition of services with just 18 beds currently existing across the state.

“In the case of young people, with the pressures that they’re under in a modern society, it’s becoming more pronounced,” he said.

“And that’s why we do believe there is a gap.”

Patients in the Step Up Step Down mental health units would receive around-the-clock care for up to 28 days.

“It can be that circuit breaker that prevents them (from) having to go to hospital,” Mr Crisafulli said.

LNP health spokeswoman Ros Bates said workforce attraction packages would be developed to help staff the units.

She could not guarantee a pediatric psychiatrist would be available at either clinic, saying they “don’t grow on trees”.

“We obviously need to put packages together so that we can attract the best and the brightest,” she said.

Cultural issues including burnout, long ED transfer times, and ramping, had made it difficult to attract medical staff to Rockhampton, Ms Bates said.

Originally published as Queensland election 2024: LNP pledges $50m for mental health units