Fears mental health funding uncertainty to hurt bush communities

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By Kate Stephens

Rural doctors say they are worried remote mental health workers will move back to the city over funding uncertainty.

Community-based mental health groups said hundreds of funding contracts were due to expire in June and were yet to be renewed by the Federal Government.

The Government is currently formulating its response to a major review of mental health funding but there is no date set yet for the report’s release.

Rural Doctors Association of Australia president Dennis Pashen said the programs needed an answer now.

“Well the risk is if there is uncertainty then people will leave, they’ll depart, they’ll look for jobs,” he said.

“Rural and remote recruitment has always been a difficult job and if people are absenting themselves because of a lack of job security then they’ll head back in to the city and we’ll lose the services that we’ve spent so long and worked so hard to get in place.

“The Minister is still considering which programs they are going to fund and we felt the concerns we had about services are going to be affected overly by any budgetary and finance cuts, particularly in regards to Indigenous communities or remote communities where services are fairly few and far between and social disadvantage is high.”