Lines attributable to Greens Spokesperson for Health and Mental Health, Jordon Steele-John:

“Labor’s budget fails to address the mental health crisis that so many in our community are feeling right now. 

“People are unable to get the mental health support they need. We know that the availability of local services, long waitlists, and the cost are major barriers to people getting mental health supports. 

The Australian Greens have today recommitted to their plan to make telehealth a permanent feature of our healthcare system.

If the Greens enter a balance of power arrangement after the election, they will push to invest $772 million over the forward estimates into expanding and strengthening telehealth services.

The Greens have today announced that in balance of power after the next election, they will push to tackle the growing mental health crisis in Australia by making mental healthcare free and unlimited for everyone who needs it as part of Medicare.

The plan, which will create universal, unlimited and available mental healthcare through Medicare, will be funded by taxing billionaires and big corporations making big profits.

Our plan will ensure everyone can access mental healthcare, when they need it, not when they can afford it.

Wednesday 30 June, 2021

Australian Greens Disability spokesperson Senator Jordon Steele-John said projections in the 2021 Intergenerational Report (IGR) did not support the Morrison government's claims the NDIS was growing unsustainability nor justify cuts to the scheme.

Senator Steele-John said the Morrison government were not being transparent with the community about claimed 'cost blowouts' in the NDIS.

“This budget is a surplus of scatter gun approaches and tinkering around the edges. 
 
“This is a budget that continues the ongoing disdain this Government has for people who have been doing it tough for a long time and for whom things have only got worse due to the global pandemic and recession: people on income support, older women, young people, single parents and disabled people.
 

The Greens say fixing Australia’s mental health crisis must be a budget priority.

The Greens will today announce key election policies, including a ‘billionaires tax’ to help fund genuinely free public schools, dental into Medicare and a job for everyone who wants one. 

With the party considering an election in November of this year still a possibility and a minority parliament the most likely outcome, Mr Bandt will push for a tax on billionaires & corporate super profits as part of dealings with a future shared power government.

The Greens have welcomed the Productivity Commission report into Mental Health and say that it has provided a clear way forward for the Government in reforming Australia’s mental health system.
 
“It is a great shame that this report has not been released earlier and that the Government didn’t take the opportunity in the recent budget to start the process of reform that is so urgently needed.

Mental illness is one of the biggest challenges of the 21st century and access to treatments should be universal. People in our community should be able to get easy access to treatments in the same way they would for a broken leg or the flu,” Australian Greens spokesperson on mental health Senator Rachel Siewert said.

Mental ill health is the leading cause of sickness and long term work incapacity in the developed world.