Wednesday, 21 June 2023

Motions

Mental health

Georgie CROZIER (Southern Metropolitan) (14:48): After that very intensive time with a very important bill, I rise to speak to this motion in my name. I move:

That this house:

(1) condemns the Andrews–Allan government for failing to:

(a) act on independent advice on trauma caused by the mental health system, published in the report commissioned by the Andrews government Not Before Time: Lived Experience-Led Justice and Repair (the report);

(b) implement the report’s recommendations to:

(i) undertake a truth and reconciliation process;

(ii) apologise to the communities identified through a restorative justice process;

(2) notes that the author of the report claims that:

(a) senior bureaucrats interfered and pressured the author to amend the report;

(b) senior bureaucrats in the Department of Health (DH) repeatedly attempted to alter the report’s scope, including forcing authors to provide recommendations to the DH rather than to the then responsible Minister for Mental Health;

(c) the Andrews government attempted to ban the author from making the report public, including threatening the author’s future employment opportunities with the government if they published the report;

(3) further notes that these interactions indicate a failure by the Minister for Mental Health to avoid discrimination in the workplace on the basis of mental health and victimisation of a person with disclosed mental ill health, which would constitute a breach of the Equal Opportunity Act 2010;

(4) requests the Minister for Mental Health to provide to the house a full and proper account of the actions taken by senior bureaucrats in DH in relation to the handling of the report; and

(5) requests that the Victorian equal opportunity and human rights commissioner urgently investigate these matters.

My motion talks about the report’s recommendations and the failing of the government to be able to implement those recommendations. The author of the report has made several claims about what had occurred amongst a number of senior bureaucrats and how the department had altered some of the issues around what the lived experiences which were in the report found, which I will speak to in a moment, and the banning of the author of the report, including, which is quite extraordinary, threatening the author’s future employment opportunities if it was published.

The motion goes on to speak about the failures of the Minister for Mental Health around the interactions and to avoid discrimination in the workplace. Therefore the motion requests that the minister provide to the house a full and proper account of the actions taken by senior bureaucrats in the Department of Health in relation to the handling of the specific report and that, finally and most importantly, the Victorian equal opportunity and human rights commissioner urgently investigate the matters that have been aired and claimed publicly.

This report, as I said, was commissioned by the government following the findings of the Royal Commission into Victoria’s Mental Health System – and the royal commission obviously was supported by everyone in this chamber – around the very many issues. There are many issues that are impacting those that live with mental illness, and we have seen the failure of the government to be able to support many, many Victorians who have not been able to have the support that they require at a very, very acute time. That is leading to some catastrophic outcomes, and it is also leading to more pressure within our health system.

This report, Not Before Time: Lived Experience-Led Justice and Repair, was undertaken, and I just want to read this part from the report:

In February 2021 …

The Royal Commission into Victoria’s Mental Health System handed down its final report, with 74 recommendations in total. This was a policy-focused Royal Commission that outlined a future mental health and wellbeing system.

However, consumers and survivors, and families, carers and supporters continued to confront unresolved trauma from the system. It was difficult to see a future mental health and wellbeing system when that system failed to acknowledge its past and confront its present.

In May 2022, the Department of Health commissioned advice to the Minister for Mental Health on how their government could formally acknowledge harms in the mental health system.

This became the State acknowledgement of harm project.

The task, from this report, was to advise the Minister for Mental Health on how to formally acknowledge harms in Victoria’s mental health system. To do that, a reference group of 10 consumers, survivors, family members, carers and supporters was set up. Many of these people obviously were connected to those that had the lived experience or they had lived experience themselves. It was crucial to a whole range of people within the community, and there was a whole range of people in the community that were contacted to provide that input.

What this report did then was critical in terms of what had happened, but Mr Katterl, who is the author of this report, has made some allegations around the failures of the government, the senior bureaucrats and what his report, which I have just read from, was talking about. The claims, according to news reports and from Mr Katterl’s own public statements on social media – on Twitter – are many. They go through a series of claims around how he was speaking out about how he was pressured by the Victorian government to change and not release the report:

False meetings were made up in a discussion with an executive where it was purported that our disagreements were dealt with (that it was advice to the Department, not Minister).

That was not his understanding. There were other claims by Mr Katterl on his social media feed:

It was consistently claimed, on several occasions, that I misunderstood the project and that it was always advice to the Department, not Minister. All meeting minutes and project plans said Advice to the MINISTER. This was gaslighting of the highest order.

I was not, clearly, in those meetings, so I cannot verify them. I cannot say if they were accurate or not. But what I can say is this motion goes to the heart of these claims and this report. Mr Katterl said that was his experience in dealing with the department. He also says that he was pressured and he was threatened and that senior bureaucrats in the Department of Health interfered by attempting to alter the scope of the report so that those recommendations, as I have previously mentioned, were recommendations to the department and not actually to the minister. He was also pressured to remove a recommendation to allow patients and carers who had suffered to tell their story publicly. As a result of all of these elements, he felt very unwell and felt that this behaviour and the treatment that he was receiving from the government was having a very serious impact on him where he felt suicidal – so a very significant impact indeed. And that is the whole issue around why we think this needs to be investigated by the Victorian Equal Opportunity and Human Rights Commission. As he said, the report found Victorians subjected to mental health treatment were forced to endure gross human rights violations and that because of those findings, they were not able to be put out into the public domain.

All of those aspects that I have just previously mentioned around his mental health and wellbeing and his interpretations and experience of what occurred within the department and with the senior bureaucrats need to be investigated. We think there needs to be an arms-length investigation and that the Victorian equal opportunity and human rights commissioner should undertake that independent investigation and do it as a matter of priority. That would at least then see what Mr Katterl was also requesting – that an urgent inquiry into these threats that he has alleged occurred to him be undertaken ‍– and that investigation can then get to the bottom of what actually went on and make recommendations. And really, if there are issues around what the government has provided and done or not done and it has manipulated the report, changed the report or made these threatening claims, then that is just completely unacceptable. I mean, if that is the case, that is just completely unacceptable and Mr Katterl has every right to be extremely disappointed and frustrated and very, very concerned about what the government has undertaken.

So we say that that is why this motion is an important one. These issues have been raised in the public domain – they are very well documented – but if the government did force change on an independent report, then that needs to be called out. What is the point in asking these people with lived experience to undertake this report and get that advice and provide it to the government if the government are not going to look at it and if it is just a tick-the-box exercise to say they have done it? What is the point of any of that? No wonder Mr Katterl is so frustrated and feels so extraordinarily let down by the government.

I think it is an important motion and I think it is important that we get to the bottom of it, so I would urge all members to support this motion so that we can have that independent investigation and the equal opportunity and human rights commissioner can undertake this work, get to the bottom of it and get a proper report to the government and to the Parliament so that Victorians understand exactly what went on.

Sarah MANSFIELD (Western Victoria) (14:58): Can I first acknowledge all those consumers, survivors, their families, carers and supporters who have experienced harm in the mental health and associated systems. I also acknowledge all of those who contributed to the Not Before Time report. It is sobering reading, and I would encourage all members of the house to take the time to read it. By centring lived experiences it demonstrates the need for truth-telling and recognition of the harms experienced in order to genuinely reform how people living with mental health conditions are treated and build greater trust in systems that should be providing care and support. While mental health systems and practices have improved significantly over time and our mental healthcare workforce does an incredible job in what are often very complex and challenging situations, delivering life-changing and life-saving care every day, we also know that we have a long way to go. This was demonstrated during the Royal Commission into Victoria’s Mental Health System and is again illustrated in the Not Before Time report. People are still experiencing harm, and pervasive stigma, chronic under-resourcing across many sectors of our society and failure to acknowledge past wrongs all contribute to the perpetuation of that harm.

Regarding the motion before us, with respect to the first part, we agree that this report warrants a response from the government, but it should be sensitive and considered. These are difficult issues requiring well-thought-out and genuine actions. Condemning the government for failing to have undertaken a response to a report released a week ago is somewhat unreasonable. This motion is critical of the government for not having already implemented a truth and reconciliation process, amongst other things. We could all agree, I am sure, that such a process is complex and should not be rushed. It must be done properly if we are to do those with lived experience of harm from the mental health and associated systems justice. As stated, we believe this report warrants a meaningful response to the recommendations, and we undertake to work with the government on these issues.

Regarding the second and third parts of this motion, as a broad principle we believe the government should not suppress or alter reports just because it does not agree with the contents. The right approach is to release the report and respond to it publicly – debate it publicly. While the public claims around what has occurred with this report are very concerning and in our view warrant further investigation and action by the government, we do not believe this motion’s approach is the right one. Indeed the report’s author has publicly indicated that they do not support the process proposed in this motion. For these reasons, the Greens will not be supporting the motion.

Lee TARLAMIS (South-Eastern Metropolitan) (15:01): I move:

That debate on this motion be adjourned until later this day.

Motion agreed to and debate adjourned until later this day.