Jayden Howe and Holly McLeish from Headspace Echuca when they visited Deniliquin in 2023.
A campaign for a Headspace centre in Deniliquin has been intensified.
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The Deniliquin Mental Health Awareness Group (Deni MHAG) has highlighted the urgent need for increased access to early intervention mental health supports and tailored services for local young people.
Headspace provides early intervention services to young people 12-25 years of age, delivered face to face and via e-health options.
Deni MHAG is being well supported by local service providers and community partners in its efforts, with strong letters of support having been submitted from Intereach, Vinnies Services, Yarkuwa Indigenous Knowledge Centre, Edward River Council, Murray Irrigation Ltd and the Deniliquin Pastoral Times.
These efforts have been ongoing since the Headspace Board visited the Deniliquin community in December 2021, where the urgent needs of local youth were discussed.
Following this visit Deni MHAG established a working party, which met for 18 months gathering information, sharing data and meeting with Murrumbidgee Primary Health Network (MPHN) which commissions services across the Murrumbidgee footprint when funding becomes available for Headspace services.
At the time, Deni MHAG also met with Member for Farrer Sussan Ley to impress the urgency for increased youth mental health services in Deniliquin and advocacy to the Minister for Health.
“We have written to the Headspace Board on several occasions, however it has been made clear that the decision for allocation of Headspace funding sits with the Commonwealth Government, and as such we have now renewed our efforts, with direct correspondence to the Minister for Health Mark Butler and a number of other political pathways,” explained Lourene Liebenberg from Deni MHAG.
“We have impressed on them that three years have passed, and nothing has changed for us in Deniliquin with regards to increased access to early intervention services for youth. Waitlists for services that are available in Deniliquin remain long.”
While Headspace in Echuca opened more than two years ago, there is no clinical outreach to Deniliquin and the biggest barrier for our youth accessing this service is and remains transport and associated costs related to travel.
There are also very few Medicare registered practitioners who can provide counselling in Deniliquin, making out of pocket expenses prohibitive for most youth and families.
Deni MHAG currently has a survey out asking for community input and providing information on the steps the community can take to support this advocacy effort. This survey can be found on the Deni MHAG Facebook page or at https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/CP78T7V
Community input will strengthen MHAG and its community partners’ ongoing advocacy.
In the meantime community members are encouraged to write to Sussan Ley, Member for Farrer, at farrer@aph.gov.au asking for support of the Deni MHAG advocacy for a Headspace Centre in Deniliquin and for her office to make representation to the federal Minister for Health Mark Butler.
For any enquiries email denimhag@gmail.com
Jayden Howe, Holly McLeish and Meaghan Sully from Headspace Echuca when they attended a mini-conference on mental health and wellbeing hosted in Deniliquin in October 2023.
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