Dr WOODRUFF - Minister, the CAMHS reforms are very welcome and we welcome the fact that they were all accepted. It's very important that they were. In relation to how they are rolled out, can you please walk us through the recommendations. You might need to take the action responses one by one. You've allocated $4 million over two years for these reforms. Can you please detail how much of that money will go to each of those actions? I don't understand why some of these reforms have no funding after two years? They are about service delivery and ongoing service delivery and I would've thought that should involve funding further into the forward Estimates?
Mr ROCKLIFF - We have accepted all the recommendations and committed $4 million over two years to commence the implementation of phase one of the service improvements. We welcome reform. It is a priority. We are committed to getting it right and we are taking a stepped approach to build an integrated best-practice evidence-based mental health system.
The implementation and our acceptance of all seven recommendations of the review commits to three overarching actions and implementation time frames. The rationale behind the new organisational structure to drive and maintain meaningful change was the need for a statewide leadership and management structure that includes medical and administrative functions. It needs to be established as a priority. That will be established during the financial year of 2020 21 year.
The overarching goal of this action is to ensure that CAMHS services are co-ordinated and provide a consistent evidence-based service, a statewide leadership and management structure that includes medical and admin functions needs to be established as a priority. This would entail reorganising existing CAMHS senior positions to establish and fund statewide director and manager position. Of particular urgency is the appointment of the statewide clinical director to provide clinical leadership in progressing the reforms. The introduction of these positions and their role in the service will require the development of a new governance arrangement. Specifically, there will be a need to form leadership and senior groups to better standardise approaches to service provision, training and staff development to reflect a new approach to operating the Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services. Concurrent with changes to governance, improved approaches to monitor and evaluate services using available service data need to be developed and maintained. Continuous service improvement, including links to research and program evaluation, should be encouraged at all levels of the organisation.
Relationships with academic institutions with experience in the evaluation of mental health services, specifically in relation to CAMHS, should be developed and integrated with the changes in the governance structure through partnerships with academic staff and academic institutions. Relevant recommendations to that over-arching strategy is recommendations one, five and seven.
The models of care and changing existing functions
Dr WOODRUFF - Excuse me, minister. I have the same Government response in front of me that you're reading from. I can see that that's welcome. My question was about the money in this current financial year -
Mr ROCKLIFF - Yes, phase 1, $4 million.
Dr WOODRUFF - Yes, $1.5 million this year, next year $2.5 million. My question was, of those three actions where does that money breakdown for the -
Mr ROCKLIFF - Of the three phases?
Dr WOODRUFF - You've got action one, action two. Action one is to be established this year. How much of that $1.5 million will go to doing that work? How much of the $1.5 million and $2.5 million over the next couple of years will go towards action 2 and how much will go towards action 3?
Mr ROCKLIFF - I will refer to Mr Webster with respect to this matter concerning the new tiered management team and those things which I have mentioned for more detail.
Mr WEBSTER - It breaks down so there is approximately $500 000 for the senior clinical lead that we need to establish, $1.8 million for the dedicated service for children in out-of-home care, $1 million for the youth early intervention service and $500 000 to building the capacity of the Perinatal and Infant Mental Health Service across the north and north west, emphasising, as the minister said in his response to Mr Tucker, that the out-of-home care and the early intervention service is the first of multiple services we rolled out in those two spaces.
Dr WOODRUFF - Some of that money will be spent in this financial year and the remaining will be spent in the following financial year - is that how it goes?
Mr WEBSTER - That is right. We have developed the models of care and recruit the statewide clinical director immediately and that is the salary ongoing. With the models of care developed, then we recruit and staff the services, so that is why it increases in the second year.
Dr WOODRUFF - Okay, and then in the subsequent forward Estimates, what happens to the staffing expenditure?
Mr ROCKLIFF - The next budget process which we will undertake almost immediately will be for the next iteration of phase 2 and phase 3 of the reforms.
Dr WOODRUFF - It is unusual to make a commitment to creating a facility in an ongoing service and not put in any funding. I can see that budgets change each year but still there is nothing in there for the outgoing years in the Budget.
Mr ROCKLIFF - We are committed to all the reforms and recommendations. My role as Minister for Mental Health and Wellbeing is to advocate very strongly to ensure that as we progress through the reforms phase 1 is completed and we need to do further analysis and work when it comes to exactly what will be required as we roll out the further reforms and recommendations into phases 2 and 3. My expectation is that work will be undertaken and form part of the next budget cycle.