“This 2024-2025 Pre-Budget Submission (the Submission) was developed in consultation with members of the NSW Faculty and Section Subcommittees, members of the NSW Branch Committee, and other stakeholders. This submission highlights and summarises the state of mental health service delivery in this State in a snapshot. We acknowledge the need for reform of, and investment in, the sector, and see this as a body of work, during this parliament, that commences with the Gap Analysis, which is underway. But we also highlight areas that need urgent attention and initiatives that must continue.”

“The New South Wales (hereafter NSW) mental health system is caught in a vicious cycle of underinvestment. A decade of funding acute services at the expense of community-based mental health services created a system that can only respond to people after they have reached a point of crisis. Urgent reform is required and the longer it takes, the more costly it will be. Currently, NSW invests the least into mental health services per capita, compared to all other Australian States and Territories, and is the only State where mental health spending per capita has decreased in the past decade. 1 This gap that will only widen further after new reform commitments made by State governments in Victoria, Queensland and Western Australia.”