WESTERN suburbs residents are expected to be hardest hit by Monday’s closure of Victoria’s only 24-hour mental health helpline.
The decision comes in the wake of a “jump-from-height” suicide in Melbourne’s west on Saturday.
State Williamstown MP Wade Noonan said Department of Human Services data showed more than a quarter of the 800 monthly calls to the Mental Health Advice Line came from Melbourne’s north-west.
The line closed at midnight on Monday.
Mental Health Minister Mary Wooldridge’s spokesman, Michael Moore, said the advice line had not met expectations. He said it averaged only 800 calls a month, compared to other services such as Lifeline, which received nearly 10,000 monthly calls.
“Discontinuing the service will also help reduce the confusion in the community around the number of telephone lines people can call.
“Anyone calling the mental health advice line will be transferred to Nurse-on-Call, which operates 24 hours a day.”
Mr Noonan, who is the opposition parliamentary health secretary, said
some callers had immediately been referred to an emergency department for treatment.
“I don’t want to put too fine a point on it, but it might be the difference between life and death for some.”
Mr Noonan claimed the line’s closure was a cost-cutting measure that would increase the existing stress on frontline mental health services.
Health and Community Services Union state secretary Lloyd Williams agreed that the line’s closure would place more pressure on workers.
“It’s reflective of cuts across the board in the mental health sector and the demand for mental health services is spiralling out of control.”
The director of New View Psychology, Maria Mercuri, said many western suburbs residents relied on services like the advice line because it could take months to get access to a psychologist.
“Finance is a big factor and to get on to a bulk-billing psychologist is very difficult, so people ended up waiting a long time to get treatment.”
Youth worker Les Twentyman said the government was putting dollars before lives.
By the time of going to press, the government had not said where money saved from closing the Mental Health Advice Line would be redirected.
■An investigation has been completed into whether the installation of safety barriers on the West Gate Bridge has shifted suicide to other locations.
The Coroners Court and the Australian Institute of Suicide Research and Prevention
have completed a report into “jump-from-height” suicides in Victoria between 1990 and 2008. Its findings are yet to be released.
Lifeline: 131114
Suicide Helpline Victoria, 1300651251
