Te Tāhuhu: Improving Mental Health outlines Government policy and priorities for mental health and addiction for the 10 years between 2005 and 2015, and provides an overall direction for investment in mental health and addiction. It builds on the current Mental Health Strategy contained in Looking Forward (1994) and Moving Forward (1997), and the Mental Health Commission’s Blueprint for Mental Health Services (1998).
Te Tāhuhu – Improving Mental Health has been informed by extensive public consultation and consultation with the health sector over the past 18 months and responds, in particular to the calls from the sector for a more strategic and over-arching plan. It is based on an outcomes framework and describes ten leading challenges that need to be addressed in order for government outcomes for mental health and addiction to be achieved.
Key Results
Outcome Statements
All New Zealanders in their communities
People:
- make informed decisions to promote their mental health and wellbeing
- value diversity and support and enable people with experience of mental illness and addiction to fully participate in society and in the everyday life of their communities and whānau.
Services:
- see a trusted and high-performing mental health and addiction sector, and have confidence that if they need them, they can access high-quality mental health and addiction services.
People with experience of mental illness and addiction
Person:
- have the same opportunities as everyone else to fully participate in society and in the everyday life of their communities and whānau.
Service:
- experience trustworthy agencies that work across boundaries and enable service users to lead their own recovery
- experience recovery-focused mental health services that provide choice, promote independence, and are effective, efficient, responsive and timely.
Whānau and friends who support and who are affected by people with experience of mental illness and addiction
Person:
- maintain their own wellbeing and participate in society and in the everyday life of their communities and whānau
Service:
- experience agencies that operate in a way which enables them to support their family members’ recovery and maintain their own wellbeing
Leading Challenges
Promotion and prevention: Promote mental health and wellbeing and prevent mental illness and addiction.
Building mental health services: Build and broaden the range and choice of services and supports, which are funded for people who are severely affected by mental illness.
Responsiveness: Build responsive services for people who are severely affected by mental illness and/or addiction.
Workforce and culture for recovery: Build a mental health and addiction workforce -- and foster a culture amongst providers -- that supports recovery, is person centred, culturally capable, and delivers an ongoing commitment to assure and improve the quality of services for people.
Māori mental health: Continue to broaden the range, quality and choice of mental health and addiction services for MāoriPrimary health careBuild and strengthen the capability of the primary health care sector to promote mental health and wellbeing and to respond to the needs of people with mental illness and addiction.
Addiction: Improve the availability of and access to quality addiction services, and strengthen the alignment between addiction services and services for people with mental illness.
Funding mechanisms for recovery: Develop and implement funding mechanisms for mental health and addiction that support recovery, advance best practice and enable collaboration.
Transparency and trust: Strengthen trust in services and accountability and information systems.
Working together: Strengthen cross-agency working together.
Implementation of Te Tāhuhu: Improving Mental Health 2005–2015: The Second New Zealand Mental Health and Addiction Plan.
The next step is for the development of an Action Plan to implement Te Tāhuhu. Government expects both the Ministry of Health and DHBs to jointly develop an agreed action plan to tackle the leading challenges. The Ministry of Health and DHBs will work with sector stakeholder representatives in developing the Action Plan, which will be reported to Cabinet by March 2006.