Stewart Barbara: Mental Health Commission Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Stewart Barbara: Mental Health Commission Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
[Sitting date: 24 July 2007. Volume:640;Page:10666. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
BARBARA STEWART (NZ First) 
: 
 On behalf of New Zealand First I rise to support the second reading of the Mental Health Commission Amendment Bill. One of the purposes of this bill is to amend the Mental Health Commission Act to extend the term of the commission until 2015. It also makes a number of other amendments to the Act and previous speakers have already outlined those amendments. I must say that in New Zealand First we are very pleased with the increased amount of dollars invested in mental health. We believe that investment in mental health is critical. We are very aware that there is still a shortage of professionals in the mental health area especially for children and teenagers and we were assured when we considered the estimates that the Mental Health Commission and the Ministry of Health are working through this very issue.  
In New Zealand First we believe that the concept of a Mental Health Commission is sound as there does need to be a reporting function to the Minister. Of course we do need a body to ensure that the national mental health strategy is being implemented in order to improve mental health services overall and destigmatise mental illness. So we believe that the role is quite a vital one.  
In New Zealand First we believe that in order to give certainty to the commission members the role of this body does need to be for far longer than the 3 years that was initially granted to it. It is definitely difficult for the commission to develop a strategy implement parts of that strategy and monitor and report on progress with a 3-year deadline looming. In reality that means that for the third year its focus is elsewhere and results can be minimal due to that little bit of uncertainty. The fact that the term of the commission has now been extended to 2015 means that improved strategy and improved operational results should become apparent fairly quickly. We believe that the commission should report to the Minister regularly as well as when the Minister requests a report on a specific aspect of mental illness.  
We in New Zealand First would have liked to see the issue of addiction emphasised in the commission’s role throughout the bill. We believe that the commission should be obliged to obtain expert advice on addiction issues to the extent that perhaps one commissioner would be primarily responsible for addiction issues. But we were told throughout the select committee process that addiction issues are already implicit in the work of the Mental Health Commission and that addiction is already recognised as an aspect of mental illness so there is not really a need to have a separate commissioner for addiction issues.  
However we would have liked to ensure that an addiction advisory group was established to provide some expert advice to the commission. We all know that addiction issues are increasing and the types of addiction issues that are increasing now are ones we would never have normally identified. We know that drugs is one issue. We know that gambling is one. We know that computer-game addiction is definitely on the increase. More recently we heard that even telephoning psychics was fast becoming an addiction—women regularly telephone psychics at 99c a minute. So we have a lot of challenges in the addiction area that families have to cope with and positive steps need to be taken to deal with these challenges.  
But I must admit that throughout the select committee process we heard some very real concerns from submitters about the Mental Health Commission and its mode of operation and these do need to be solved in the short term. These problems revolve principally around family members of people with mental illness who generally express opposition to this bill. We were rather concerned in the select committee when we heard that less-than-positive report from some of the submitters.  
Later I was quite astonished when someone rang me personally. This person had been unable to take part in the select committee submission process or even to be involved in the hearings and she wanted to discuss her opposition to the continuation of the Mental Health Commission in its present form. She said that parents of mental health patients believe that the bill requires a number of very significant amendments if the commission is ever to be successful. She said that many parents believe that the commission is ideologically captured to the extent that it actually believes that everyone with a mental illness can recover and live successfully in the community or at home with the rest of the family.  
Some of the examples that we heard from people during the submission process—and one that I heard personally afterwards—were very sad. The one I heard was very sad and it was a very real example of mental illness. Quite frankly one’s heart went out to some of these people. Basically they could get nowhere with the commission. Their lives were altered totally by one family member having a mental illness to the extent that some of them were living in real fear for their lives.  
The lady who rang me told me that her son who lived at home had set the house on fire three times. She said that he could not help himself that he could not even remember having set the house on fire and that basically her son would never recover from his illness. It could be managed by drugs as long as the drugs were regularly taken but sometimes despite her very best efforts her son absolutely refused to take them. To her the commission’s statement that recovery from mental illness is possible is totally wrong.  
We also heard of the Mental Health Commission stating at public meetings that a person known to the commission had stopped taking their medication and was managing quite well without it. We were told that as a result of this other people also decided to stop taking their medication without the advice of their doctor and generally wreaked havoc in the community and—again—at home. Some of these people have been picked up and charged by the police and some of them consequently go to prison because of the trouble they create. Unfortunately prison is one of the few places in which they feel secure. Their medication is given to them very regularly and they cannot really refuse to take it. These people cannot live in the community and need the strict regime of an institution. In this case it is prison. It is sad that prison actually provides a secure environment for these mentally ill people. That is not really what prison is all about.  
So there does appear to be a need to have a provision for long-term care that protects patients families and the police. We all know there have been very tragic examples of this need for protection; for instance the Mark Burton case in Queenstown where mental illness was involved.  
We believe that there are some challenges ahead for the Mental Health Commission. Now with this bill it will have time to assess its mode of operation and practices and to put them right. New Zealand First definitely has some concerns after hearing the submissions and we look forward to the commission rectifying those concerns. In 2015 we believe that Parliament needs to reassess the role and the performance of the commission before any further extensions can be granted.  
Perhaps the commission needs to involve a parent representative—someone who has the responsibility of looking after a person with mental illness; someone who understands the stresses and strains of parents coping at home. The rights of the family need to be considered. If the Mental Health Commission is to assist parents and be on the same track as parents which we would like to see then that does need to be considered.  
We believe that the credibility of the Mental Health Commission is absolutely paramount. Perhaps someone like John Kirwan who has done an outstanding job in bringing to depression the understanding that it needs does need to have an active role in the commission. But whatever it does the commission cannot afford to isolate parent groups as it appears to have done. Some very constructive work is needed so that parents and the Mental Health Commission are at least working together for the future of mental health patients. The commission cannot afford to work in isolation and go off on a totally different tangent.  
In New Zealand First we look forward to this challenge being resolved. As I said New Zealand First supports this bill and we look forward to improved feedback in 2015 on this very important commission.