The Australian Psychological Society (APS) has welcomed the Australian Labor Party's election announcement of a $1 billion mental health package.
The promised investment includes an additional 500 postgraduate psychology student places as part of an investment that includes:
- More than 1,200 new training places for mental health professionals and peer workforce
- 20 new Youth Specialist Care Centres, expanded headspace services, and
- Medicare Mental Health Centres across the country.
APS President Dr Sara Quinn said the package contributes to critical issues the APS has long raised, including workforce shortages, long wait times, and growing pressure on overstretched mental health professionals.
"This is a welcome commitment that will help build the psychology workforce of the future," Dr Quinn said.
"For too long, the system has been held together by professionals working under strain. This package begins to address one of the key barriers to access - not enough psychologists to meet growing demand."
Dr Quinn said the commitment to more than 500 psychology training places — a key component of the package — is especially important.
"We're particularly pleased to see this investment in growing the workforce. But to truly meet community need, we want to see training places support all areas of practice endorsement – including clinical neuropsychology, clinical, community, counselling, educational and developmental, forensic, health, organisational, and sport and exercise psychology" she said.
"People deserve access to the right psychologist at the right time, no matter where they live or what mental health challenges they may be experiencing.
"Psychologists are trained to deliver early intervention and prevention programs across the lifespan, helping reduce long-term system burden and improve community wellbeing.
"Their work spans schools, workplaces, justice settings and health and community settings, where they identify risk and protective factors, support resilience, and deliver population-level mental health responses," Dr Quinn explained.
"Ensuring all areas of practice endorsement are supported through workforce investment will maximise access to these broad capabilities and ensure Australians get the right care, at the right time, in the right setting."
The APS welcomed the package's strong youth focus, including:
- 20 Youth Specialist Care Centres, provided they are staffed with psychologists paid at a professional level
- 31 walk-in Medicare Mental Health Centres, which must be staffed with appropriately paid psychologists and designed to support both young people and adults
- Expansion of 58 headspace locations, particularly in areas of high service demand and workforce shortage.
Dr Quinn also emphasised that growth in the psychology workforce cannot happen without funded placements and supervision infrastructure.
"Each funded placement is a strategic investment in system capacity. It not only trains a future psychologist — it also helps retain talent in a system under pressure," she said.
"We need targeted investment in placement access - especially in rural, remote, and community-led services - to build a diverse and well-distributed workforce working on prevention, early intervention and treatment."
"And we need supervision funding. Training relies on experienced psychologists being resourced to supervise in priority areas like youth mental health, trauma, perinatal mental health, early psychosis, and regional and rural care."
The APS also welcomed the Coalition's recent commitments to restore 20 Medicare-subsidised psychology sessions and invest $400 million in youth mental health. Dr Quinn said the momentum across parties is encouraging, but further reform is needed.
"This is the kind of bold investment we need - but it must be just the beginning," Dr Quinn said.
"We now urge all parties to build on this momentum and commit to a mental health system that works - for both clients and mental health professionals."
Dr Quinn said the new services would help relieve pressure on existing programs, including Better Access, but warned that further reform is needed to ensure people receive the right care for as long as they need it.
"These new centres and workforce investments will take pressure off the Better Access program, support psychologists to work to their full scope of practice and allow more time to treat people with moderate to high mental health needs," she said.
"But to be effective, they must be paired with reforms that recognise the reality of providing psychology services - people with moderate to high needs require at least 20 sessions, not just 10. Restoring and extending Medicare-funded sessions must remain a key part of the solution, and we need the ALP to acknowledge this."
The APS continues to call for practical reforms to improve care through:
- Bulk billing incentives and a $0 youth mental health safety net threshold
- An increase to the number of Medicare-subsidised psychology sessions
- A strong and responsive NDIS that recognises the important role of psychologists
- More psychologists in aged care and education
- First Nations mental health
- Youth wellbeing and early intervention
- Support for domestic and family violence victim-survivors
- Committed support for veterans, and defence personnel.
Dr Quinn said psychologists are ready to lead the implementation of these reforms - with the right support.
"The psychology workforce is rigorously trained, ready, and willing to meet demand - but we need structured, supported pathways to do it," she said. "If we want to transform mental health care in this country, we must invest in highly qualified professionals - not just infrastructure.
"This election is our opportunity to build a system that's fairer, stronger, and sustainable for the long term."
