Wall LouisaLOUISA WALL (Labour—Manurewa): Tēnā koe e Te Māngai o Te Whare. Tēnā koutou katoa. It is an absolute pleasure as the chair of the Health Committee to receive the Mental Health and Wellbeing Commission Bill from the Minister of Health. Can I firstly congratulate the Government—obviously our Labour team but also New Zealand First and our coalition partner the Greens—because mental health for us has been a priority but I also want to acknowledge as espoused by Matt Doocey that this issue this kaupapa is also a priority for the National Party. I want to acknowledge that in being really clear about that priority we in good faith undertook a process to establish a cross-party working group on mental health and addictions wellbeing and that was a recommendation of He Ara Oranga. So I'd like to acknowledge the leadership of Matt Doocey and also of Chlöe Swarbrick and Jenny Marcroft and also David Seymour to enable us to come together—Chlöe Swarbrick: You're not looking too shabby. LOUISA WALL: Thank you Chlöe. I'm not too shabby either and I am a member. But we essentially were pulled together because we are incredibly passionate about mental health and addictions wellbeing and as Matt Doocey has said in the past historically mental health issues were seen as a terrible thing. People were incarcerated—you know they were treated appallingly. We had institutions that locked people up for life. Then we went through a deinstitutionalisation process and now actually we're going through a process of being really proactive about anticipating New Zealanders who are going to have mental health and addiction challenges in their lives. So the He Ara Oranga process I think demonstrated how much of a priority it was for this Government. We actively went out and we heard from New Zealanders—New Zealanders like my colleagues Matt Doocey and Chlöe Swarbrick who have shared their own personal experiences of mental health challenges. So we heard from whānau and we heard from individuals and a lot of the disclosures have meant that the importance of establishing this Mental Health and Wellbeing Commission to as the Minister said coordinate and be strategic right across the Public Service is incredibly important. I want to acknowledge within that context our advocates and when I think about our advocates as espoused in the bill it is Māori. So it is our kaupapa Māori providers our Whānau Ora providers our Pacific peoples providers those who care for our disability sector the rainbow sector and in the bill it says other groups that experience poorer mental health and wellbeing outcomes." and I want to specifically note the needs of rural New Zealand. There is a divide between rural New Zealand and urban New Zealand and within the rural context I want to specifically highlight the needs of our farmers. There may be justification in clause 13 of this bill because what it does is say to this wonderful commission that we're going to establish that they must seek specifically the views of Māori Pacific disabled and then it says "other groups … who have disproportionately poorer mental health" and I guess I'm putting out there that I also think of rural New Zealanders who because of distance and because of access to services need to be taken into consideration. The difference between rural and city statistics is that in the rural communities 16 per 100000 suicide and in the cities 11.2 per 100000 suicide. The other issue we seem to have in addition to the rainbow community which I also want to specifically address—because we know through youth health surveys and data that if you're a young rainbow person you're four times more likely to self-harm. If you're trans you're five times more likely to self-harm and to attempt suicide. So these issues are incredibly important these communities are incredibly important and actually in this debate and on International Men's Day I want to say that our men and men's voices are incredibly important. If we look at our statistics 68 percent of those who suicide are men and we have particular issues in the 15- to 19-year-old age group and the 20- to 24-year-old age group. So here is a challenge. It's complex. This doesn't just affect one part of our society and so we have a lot of work to do which means we have a lot of people to listen to and to take into consideration. So I want to acknowledge that of the 40 recommendations in He Ara Oranga the establishment of this Mental Health and Wellbeing Commission was one of those recommendations. What I want to highlight is that this organisation will be an independent Crown entity. Now the nature of an independent Crown entity is that they can hold the Government to account. They are independent and as the Minister said they can report on any matter that affects any Minister. What I want to highlight from the bill which I think is really really important is that we're going to look at the social determinants of mental health and addiction wellbeing. We actually care about the context of the people who are seeking help in terms of their housing in terms of their employment situation the relevance of poverty what the social attitudes are to those particular groups and are these groups experiencing discrimination and for me that's where the issue of our rainbow youth is particularly pertinent. I want to acknowledge that my colleague Marja Lubeck also has a bill here in our Parliament that wants to look at sexual orientation change efforts because those efforts actually undermine our young people's identity and if they give effect to issues of self-harm and suicide then we need to do something about that because inherent in that is discrimination. As I mentioned earlier this whole issue of mental health and addictions wellbeing has gone from being one of those issues that no one talked about and it was out of sight and out of mind to being something that actually affects all of us—every single one of us—and particularly our children. So I want to put on the table that I'm expecting submissions from specific groups that say "Hey our voice isn't specifically included in clause 13 and maybe it should be." I guess the other issue to highlight is that we've pre-empted the establishment of the Mental Health and Wellbeing Commission by appointing in September this year Hayden Wano who is chairing the initial Mental Health and Wellbeing Commission. For me that's significant because this is a priority. We know it's an issue for Māori and we have a Māori who's the chair of this initial commission. One of the aspects that they've been asked to look at is to develop advice for the permanent Mental Health and Wellbeing Commission so that it can make swift progress once it is established. I think the fact that we've included Māori significantly—and I actually want to highlight the other members of those groups. If I look at the other Māori we have Dr Julie Wharewera-Mika who's a clinical psychologist. She works in child and adolescent community mental health and she is a specialist dealing with survivors of sexual violence and has specific expertise in Māori mental health workforce development. I want to highlight that we have Kendall Flutey who teaches children. So we have prioritised a particular profession that is working with our rangatahi and I think that sends a clear signal about the priority.I also want to acknowledge Kevin Hague who is a member of this initial Mental Health and Wellbeing Commission. We all know Kevin—incredibly passionate advocate smart man has been a chair of a district health board—and I think his involvement is a signal. It is a signal—can I also say to the rainbow community—that we matter. We also have Kelly Pope who is a mental health advocate. She's a young person and she works with young people mental health and youth peer support.So when I think about the platform that we're creating and the people that we have involved in the creation of this Mental Health and Wellbeing Commission for me I feel a sense of difference and transformation. This isn't business as usual you know. This is definitely a response to all those voices all those people that we heard in the He Ara Oranga process. There were over 5200 submissions over 400 meetings around the country. So I'm hoping that the people who participated in that process feel validated in the sharing of these stories; they feel validated that in the creation of this Mental Health and Wellbeing Commission we are taking seriously what they said to the Government. As an initial response can I say that I'm incredibly proud to be part of a Government that has prioritised mental health that is enabling people to talk about mental health and wellbeing and who wants to work with people across Government non-governmental organisations the business community and our whānau so that we're able to speak up and ask for help and actually we have a responsive mental health and addiction system that can meet every need in the most appropriate way. Kia ora."