SANE Community Feedback on the Federal Budget - May 2024

[chibam]

---

@Zoe7 wrote:

This may be of interest @chibam as it aligns with a lot of your point above

https://psychology.org.au/insights/federal-budget-2024-25-only-scratches-the-surface

---

I think that anything put out by APS needs to be taken with a grain of salt, @Zoe7 . Even their own members don't trust them; particularly when it comes to weighing in on government policy.

There was an inquiry a few years back, and a large number of the submissions were from APS member therapist who all repeatedly stated that the official advice peddled by APS tended to overemphasize the importance and value of "clinical" therapists, usually at the expense of "non-clinical" therapists. This was apparently because the upper management tier of APS is predominantly made up of "clinical" therapists, whereas the overall membership of APS is overwhelmingly "non-clinical" therapists.

So apparently, the top dogs were in the habit of screwing over their own members with their government advice.

But as I say, that was a few years ago, so maybe there's been a shakeup in the meantime?
Although, TBH, I still found that press release to be very self-serving.

They (therapists) want to be the ones to decide how many sessions a patient gets. They want to be the ones who decide how "psychologist assistants" are used. They don't want anybody coming in and usurping their jobs. In fact, there's not much within that release that can't be construed as them just trying to rake in more business for themselves.

What about what the patient wants? That's what I'd like to know.

Again, in this release we see no mention of the assistance that patients actually want. APS glosses over such considerations, in order to tout the "evidance-based" treatments that the therapists want to administer.

TBH, I think the idea of stripping the government of the power to decide how many sessions a patient does, and handing that power over to the therapist is just asking for trouble. You'd be removing the last line of defence that might possibly keep the therapist in-check. What would be there to stop con-artist therapists from deciding that their patients are horrendously and incurably sick, and signing them up for once-a-week sessions for the rest of their lives?

I shudder to think what I would've gone through, if my therapist had had the power to dictate how many discounted sessions I got. As it was, I suspect she was just using me as a tool to fleece the government.

[chibam]

---

@Zoe7 wrote:

@chibam It is pretty much all clumped under the "Strengthening Medicare' banner without much elaboration.

See this link here 

---

One thing that has caught my interest, though, is these mentions of "psychologist assistants" in those two sites you linked. I can't recall reading that term before.

Going off google, it seems like they are mainly just glorified secretaries - essentially handling the more beaurocratic aspects of the psychologist's job for them. But it would be interesting to know if they take on any other jobs, and especially if they add new capabilities to the mental health system, from the patient's point-of-view.

[chibam]

---

@Glisten wrote:

The Albanese Government will establish a Commonwealth Prac Payment to support students undertaking mandatory workplace placements required for university and vocational education and training qualifications.

Australians studying to be a teacher, a nurse, a midwife or a social worker will be eligible for this payment, but not Psychology students.

---

---

@DW_ wrote:

Absolutely. The cost of studying to be a psychologist and reaching registration is high. Why would they not be included? 

---

@Glisten  @DW_  TBH, I'd be glad to see a lot of the emphasis taken off of college as the one-and-only route to becoming a therapist.

Instead of making it easier to get the education that's currantly required for someone to be aloud to be a therapist, I'd much prefer to see the government creating new therapist job vacancies that don't come with any educational requirements at all.

For one thing, the currant system creates a staffing bottleneck, in which the understaffed industry of today has to wait another 4 years for any massive influx of new workers to get through the college courses that are demanded for them to get the job (and no doubt, you'll lose a few potential workers there through students dropping out). So that's a major problem.

But far more importantly is that this system whittles down your potential workforce until you've only got one type of person working (at least, in any meaningful role) in the mental health industry: college graduates.

Where does that leave patients who don't want that sort of person for a therapist?

Some of us don't believe that education is a good thing, or a route to "improving" yourself, as others seem to believe. Others might come from families or neighborhoods that contain numerous college graduates, and have found those sorts of people to be self-righteous and full of themselves; qualities we most definitely do not want to be saddled with in a therapist.

Personally, I often picked up vibes that my therapist thought her opinions (often about my life!) were more important then mine, because she'd gone to college and I hadn't. If I ever went into therapy again, I'd want to get the least-educated therapist I could possibly find.

There are a lot of people in despair across the country right now, and I think you'll find that an awful lot of them are less-educated people. And I wouldn't mind betting that a great many of them would love to discover that the helping hand reaching out to them belongs to an uneducated person, just like themselves. Because, as a general rule, the educated class tend not to be particularly kind to the uneducated class, and I think a lot of uneducated patients don't want to endure that judgementalism - or, at the very least - that massive gap in perspective, when they go to a therapist.

A lot of us would prefer to get help from someone who is just like us, who can relate to us, and who share as many of our foundational principals as possible.

So, personally, I don't think there's anything wrong with the government staying the course on how little it's pouring in to mental health education; just so long as it still makes up the gap in worker demand, by hiring people who don't necessarily have any education.

[NatureLover]

I think it sounds good EXCEPT it's not nearly enough! Only 361 million (over 4 years!!) when they are spending 132.7 million on sports - sports already get a lot of support in this country I think. 

I think there needs to be many more millions provided to train up many more psychologists, counsellors, drug and alcohol counsellors and psychiatrists due to the huge shortage. 

@RachSANECEO  @tyme  @Zoe7  @chibam  @Glisten  @DW_ 

[OM108]

@tyme 

IMO there needs to be more effort put into analysing what is going on and funding/supporting preventative measures.

why has mental health become such a major problem in this century???

so often the system creates these problems of disconnection and separation....and then makes money by creating so-called solutions.....

peers, guides, mentors, elders, lived experience, support, forums, selfcare, nature, flowers/herbs, nutrition, detoxification, healthy environment, community, family, friends, life....put efforts into that!

[Former-Member]

I feel there needs to be more and accurate evaluation of needs, and funds directed at mitigating those needs; rather than funding the constant discussions, the new and ever-confusing ‘peak’ bodies, and label-like ‘solutions’ that are not directed towards any particular or defined ‘problem’. 
It’s a misdirected waste of money that seems to have a singular goal of placation and ?misdirection rather than actually being targeted towards identified needs and how best to address them. 
In education and clinical practice why have counsellors been seemingly left out (I have no idea what the psychologist assistant is meant to be or do, and that sounds very much like a risk to patients due to ill-defined professional boundaries and standards) of the equation..? Someone with an undergrad can do training in as little as a year to become a counsellor, and counsellors can be extremely helpful within their scope of practice when awaiting psychologist availability, with a fully formed organisational structure, ongoing education and association membership and insurances, which may indeed help people to continue on with at least some support in place. There are also counselling qualifications available from TAFE, which is an excellent pathway for people with lived experience to enter this very valuable area of practice where they have intrinsic skills and knowledge of great value, which may lead to better access to the university courses for psychology or further counselling in the future. 
I don’t see why the govt couldn’t create a program to identify and support students with lived experience into the practitioner education they need to have the right quals to use their invaluable  LEx knowledge to help others. 
I also don’t see why the govt couldn’t support peer advocacy better, by instead using some of that money to directly employ people in LEx roles/peer roles throughout the govts from councils through to state and national levels, in key roles where they provide the LEx perspective and recommend where consultation with co-design is needed. This could save the govt much money as well as being it’s policies, procedures, and functions in line with the actual needs of the community at large. 
I’d like to stop seeing funding going to things which do not contribute to direct outcomes (like funding for more advocacy… why fund more advocacy? Why not explore and find removing the barriers that advocacy is fighting against, instead? If funding for more advocacy, that surely means that more barriers to accessing relevant supports are going to appear? It’s like the Cold War arms race in MH service provision!)

I’m tired of these ‘reaction video’ like measures that don’t address the problem, they just talk about what it feels like to have the problem (like ‘reaction videos’..there’s little point in knowing how someone feels about it when nothing is actually directed to help the original problem). 
@chibam @Glisten @RachSANECEO @tyme @DW_ @Zoe7 

thanks for reading 🙂🌺

oh, and how about more funding to support programs that actually make a difference 🙂💜

[chibam]

Lol. You know you're an insufferable gasbag when the generously-sized text box cuts out before you've finished writing your comments.😋😅 One of these days. I'm gonna learn how to become a man of few words.

[Glisten]

@chibam  That is gold. Harsh reality check LOL

G

[AussieRecharger]

It's easy to be negative. I have spent enough time around these forums to know more money won't correlate to better outcomes.

I think some fundamental truths are occurring, our lifestyles and media portrayal are all negative and it's currently cool to be negative. If you have complex trauma, with the average adult's attention span going from 7 mins 30 years ago to less than 1 minute in today's society, it's hard to imagine even professionals having the discipline to delve deeply into a person's problems.

The newest trends seem to denigrate others' trauma:

"It's Ayres Rock, not Uluru, I am sick of this aboriginal rights stuff"

Trans people are just confused idiots

Why should I be welcomed to my own country?  I am indigenous if I am born here..."

Mental health funding just addresses the trauma of our ignorance, but mental trauma will always be there while we are a disrespectful country and we are passing this down to kids and they are so confused about respecting elders who are so disrespectful themselves. 

Just my 2 cents. 

[chibam]

---

@AussieRecharger wrote:

The newest trends seem to denigrate others' trauma:

"It's Ayres Rock, not Uluru, I am sick of this aboriginal rights stuff"

Trans people are just confused idiots

Why should I be welcomed to my own country?  I am indigenous if I am born here..."

---

I can't help but think that this comes down to poor communication, perhaps on both sides. Some of it, as you indicate, is clearly mean-spirited, but there are gentler variations on most of these sentiments that are just people voicing concerns they have, usually with some understandable (if perhaps misguided) basis.

For example, a few weeks or months ago, there was that Chanel 7 Spotlight episode that explored transgenderism, and the backbone of that episode was detransitioners speaking their piece about how they regret transitioning and how they resented the societal factors they believe were pushing them towards transitioning. So you can sort of understand how well-meaning non-trans people might look at something like that and be concerned that there mightn't be enough due dilligence going on to insure that people are truly settled upon the transitions their committing to, and that their being given all the correct and true information about the transitioning process.

Granted, that coverage may be exaggerating the proportion of trans people who will ultimately wish to detransition; or perhaps it may not. If you aren't actually a member of these communities, it's hard to know precisely what's going on inside them, since almost all sources of information are basically guaranteed to have some sort of bias to them.

I think that all these issues really need an awful lot more open, two-way communication; and perhaps, a willingness to considder that there may not be a one-size-fits-all solution to some of these problems.