Response to the Statutory Review of the Western Australian Mental Health Act (2014)

The Australian Psychological Society (APS) was pleased to provide a response to the Western Australian Statutory Review of the Mental Health Act (2014) and commended the Western Australian Government’s intention to revise the Act. The Discussion Paper (the Paper) covers a breadth of topics related to the Act, however, this submission does not make comment on all sections of the Paper. Rather, we endeavoured to provide a response that highlights the most salient issues from a psychological perspective; specifically focussing on Chapter 3: Previously identified issues.

The over-arching premise of our submission was to support amendments that reinforce the intent and implementation of the Act that, first and foremost, serve to protect the human rights and dignity of people with mental ill-health, their carers and families, and which improve the quality of care and access to appropriate treatment. To reinforce this, the APS recommended that:

• The Western Australian Government continue to recognise and support the delivery of evidence-based psychological interventions to individuals requiring care and treatment related to mental ill-health.

•  The appointment of a Chief Psychologist to work alongside the Chief Psychiatrist to ensure that state of the art psychological and psychiatric interventions are implemented to produce best practice outcomes for individuals receiving treatment under the Act, and

• The Western Australian Government actively seek to partner with peak bodies in the mental health field, and the APS in particular, so that best practice clinical services can be delivered in partnerships that will lead to enhanced mental health care for all Western Australians.

View submission