Tuesday, 11 August 2026

 Georgie CROZIER (Southern Metropolitan) (13:34): (1399) I have a question for the Minister for Mental Health, and it is a serious one. The Mental Health and Wellbeing Commission’s recent status update into Victoria’s mental health reforms was drastically censored before publication: the judging criteria were altered, progress on reforms was doubled from the original report, the most critical findings were removed and ratings were changed to favour the government’s position. Minister, you received this report in December 2025. The report was released publicly on 24 June 2026, six months later. At least 75 of the original 270 status ratings suddenly improved in the doctored final version. Did you or your office direct these changes?

 Ingrid STITT (Western Metropolitan – Minister for Health, Minister for Mental Health, Minister for Ambulance Services, Special Minister of State) (13:35): I thank Ms Crozier for her question, because it gives me an opportunity to actually point out that these claims are wrong. The commission, as an independent statutory entity, is responsible for its own report, findings and assessments, including decisions about how that content is published, including decisions about the content and publication. The Mental Health and Wellbeing Commission is an important independent statutory authority that plays an important role in providing support right across the mental health and wellbeing system.

The facts of this matter are that an early draft of the Mental Health and Wellbeing Commission’s report was provided to my department at the end of 2025. The department worked with the commission and provided factual and technical feedback, and this occurred between December 2025 and May 2026. That was simply to ensure that the Mental Health and Wellbeing Commission had access to the most available and up-to-date information about our mental health system to inform its independent assessment.

To go directly to the assertions that are contained within Ms Crozier question, an embargoed copy of the final report was provided to my department on 23 June 2026 and shared with my office on 24 June 2026. I take my role very, very seriously, and the Mental Health and Wellbeing Commission, as an independent statutory authority, not only have the right to hold the government to account on the reforms that we are driving in the mental health system here in Victoria but have the right to publish their own assessment of that work.

 Georgie CROZIER (Southern Metropolitan) (13:37): I am most interested in the minister’s response, even though it did not answer the question. Minister, as you would be aware, many of the strongest concerns raised in the report, such as the impact of Labor’s budget cuts, a lack of evidence supporting government claims contained in the report and refusals of stakeholders to work with the Department of Health, were conveniently omitted from the publicly released version. Why?

 Ingrid STITT (Western Metropolitan – Minister for Health, Minister for Mental Health, Minister for Ambulance Services, Special Minister of State) (13:37): I completely reject the assertions that are contained in Ms Crozier’s questions. As a government, we are very committed to making sure that we continue to invest in mental health reforms. I would point you to the fact that our government introduced a mental health and wellbeing levy in 2022, which has seen investment in our mental health services more than double since 2019, before the royal commission handed down its report.

I want to just emphasise the nonsense that we are hearing from those opposite. The output funding in the mental health portfolio for this year, 2026–27, is over $3 billion. If you look at the Productivity Commission’s report into the national agreement on mental health and suicide prevention, you will see that the commission actually calls out that record investment of Victoria.

 Georgie CROZIER (Southern Metropolitan) (13:39): I move:

That the minister’s responses be taken into consideration on the next day of meeting.

Motion agreed to.