Gaps in mental health system ‘every parent’s nightmare’: How Victoria is letting down Lifeline

Vital suicide prevention service Lifeline is being slowed in meeting Victoria’s surging need by an Allan government funding shortfall. It comes as promised child mental health hubs are delayed.

Vital suicide prevention service Lifeline is being prevented from expanding in Victoria to meet a surging need by a state government funding shortfall.

In an official statement to the Herald Sun, Lifeline said it needed to increase the operational capacity of its eight Victorian centres to provide more crisis support — including digital text and chat services, which were effective platforms on which to counsel suicidal young people.

“In Victoria, while Lifeline receives a proportion of federal funding, and some state funding direct to centres, it does not receive an annual statewide grant from the Victorian government that would allow Victorian centres to expand their service delivery to meet increasing and more complex crisis support needs,” a spokesperson said.

Victoria’s level of funding to Lifeline is being questioned.

Extra funding from states and territories ensured local Lifeline centres were able “to adequately meet the needs of their communities”, the spokesperson said.

“For example, in NSW Lifeline currently receives $12m per year and in Queensland the government has announced a new state grant for Lifeline of $3m per year. These grants help to build capacity within these states for Lifeline centres to deliver 24/7 crisis support through telephone, text and chat and local community services,” she said.

It’s understood the Victorian government only funds Lifeline to the tune of $900,000

across six centres, with its two newest centres not receiving any funding from the state.

Lifeline is set to ask for about $7.2m in funding from the Allan government, in part to help meet the gap in calls made by Victorians, against the number of calls taken by Victorian Lifeline call centres.

In the 2023 financial year, Victorian help seekers called 314,734 times to Lifeline, with volunteers in Victoria answering just 132,318 of those calls and 182,416 Victorian calls answered by volunteers in other states and territories.

And that number is set to grow over the holiday period.

“Calls over the Christmas period are typically higher than other times of year. Lifeline is working collaboratively with the Victorian government to discuss funding options for the upcoming State Budget,” a Lifeline spokesperson said.

Labor’s $54m youth mental health promise, that never happened

Nearly a year and a half after the Victorian government promised new child mental health hubs would be opened in the state — to help address surging rates of childhood mental illness — they do not exist.

And despite a target in its Victorian Suicide Prevention Framework 2016-25 to halve the number of annual suicides by 2025, there are now more.

In 2016 there were 653 suicides. The November 2023 Victorian Coroner’s report shows there were 658 suicides by the end of October this year — five more than the 2016 toll, with two months of the year left to go.

It comes as promised $54m infant and child mental health hubs, announced on April 3, 2022 by then Minister for Mental Health James Merlino, have failed to open and Victorian residential youth workers reveal to the Herald Sun they have been left waiting more than five hours in emergency departments, with suicidal teenagers who had already self-harmed and are at risk.

Victorian residential youth workers have told of being forced to wait hours in hospital waiting rooms, with suicidal teenagers.

One worker said: “It gets to the point where you just leave. They (the hospital mental health team) follow up later with a phone call, to check on the young person’s welfare.”

Australian Institute of Health and Welfare data shows that to September 2023, there were 22 suicides by Victorians under the age of 18.

“This is higher than the number of suspected or confirmed suicide deaths recorded during this period for this age group in previous years (seven in 2022, 18 in 2021, 14 in 2020 and 13 in 2019),” it notes.

Former Deputy Premier James Merlino promised the child mental health hubs would be open in July last year, but as yet, they do not exist.

“Victorian families will soon have access to a one-stop shop for mental health support for infants, children and the whole family — with a new network of Health and Wellbeing Hubs to support the mental health of young Victorians,” Mr Merlino trumpeted at the time.

Former Mental Health Minister James Merlino with former Premier Daniel Andrews. Picture: Andrew Henshaw

“The three new hubs will deliver a range of specialist and allied health services — like paediatricians, psychologists, parenting support and speech pathologists — under one roof, making seeking support for mental health concerns easier for families.

“Providing tailored care, the hubs will deliver earlier and better outcomes for children aged 0-11 years who have developmental, behavioural and emotional challenges, as well as their families — including access to free assessments for development issues and autism.”

There would initially be three new hubs, servicing southern Melbourne, Brimbank-Melton and the Loddon areas, Mr Merlino said, adding they would “begin providing care from July 2022”.

But a Victorian Premier’s Department spokeswoman on Thursday confirmed the hubs had in fact not opened at all.

In an official statement, the government said “work is underway to deliver these new services”.

The government spokesperson later said — after the failure had been revealed by the Herald Sun — the hubs would “open in coming weeks”.

Direct questions about why they were delayed for so long and whether the promised $54m initiative had been fully funded in the first place were not answered.

Shadow minister for mental health Emma Kealy on Thursday lashed the government for not doing enough to address soaring rates of mental illness in Victoria.

“After years of promises to reform Victoria’s mental health system, it’s getting harder to get mental health support when Victorians need it most,” she said.

Shadow Minister for Mental Health Emma Kealy. Picture: Andrew Henshaw

“We keep hearing the system will be fixed but the results simply aren’t there — and it’s the grieving families who carry the devastating weight of Victoria’s health crisis.”

Ms Kealy said she had been heartbroken to read the story of Victorian teenager Monte Croke, 17, who took his own life after both he and his family pleaded for more mental health help from local services.

Monte’s mum, Tiffani Clingin, told the Herald Sun she had resorted to telling hospital staff: “If I fall to my news and beg, will you help us?”

She had also said — when an increasingly mentally unwell Monte was not being admitted to hospital as she believed he desperately needed to be — “if my son dies, will you remember me and say sorry?”

Bendigo's Monte Croke, 17, with his mother Tiffani Clingin. Picture: Supplied

Ms Kealy said it was “every parent’s nightmare” that the health system would fail their child, when they needed help most.

“This tragically happens far too often in Victoria,” she said.

The Victorian government should, at the very least, increase its funding to Lifeline, Ms Kealy said.

A Victorian government spokeswoman said the biggest reforms in the country’s history had been embarked upon to rebuild the state’s mental health system, with investments of more than $6bn to deliver recommendations from the Royal Commission into Victoria’s Mental Health System.

A Statewide Child and Family Centre had opened in October, providing residential mental health and wellbeing treatment to critically unwell children under 11, she said.

The new 12-bed centre — which allows children and their families to stay onsite while they receive therapy — had already received 11 referrals, she said.

“We’re not wasting a minute building a system that works for every Victorian to receive care as soon as they need it, no matter where they live, whether it’s walk-in, community-based care or acute hospital treatment, we’re making seeking treatment more accessible for every young Victorian — with more than $842 million invested in youth mental health, and with new services already open right across the state,” she said.