{"id":484313,"date":"2026-06-18T21:25:17","date_gmt":"2026-06-18T21:25:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/484313\/"},"modified":"2026-06-18T21:25:17","modified_gmt":"2026-06-18T21:25:17","slug":"our-mental-health-services-are-improving-unless-youre-young-maori-pasifika-or-disabled","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/484313\/","title":{"rendered":"Our mental health services are improving \u2013 unless you\u2019re young, M\u0101ori, Pasifika or disabled"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Wellbeing Commission\u2019s latest report shows measurable gains in New Zealand\u2019s mental health system \u2013 but the picture looks very different depending on who and where you are, writes Henry Oliver in today\u2019s excerpt from The Bulletin.<\/p>\n

To receive The Bulletin in full each weekday,\u00a0sign up here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

A new report from Te Hiringa Mahara \u2013 Mental Health and Wellbeing Commission has found improvements in parts of New Zealand\u2019s mental health system, but warns those gains have not reached M\u0101ori, Pasifika, or young people. The NZ Herald\u2019s Julia Gabel reports this morning<\/a> that the commission found access to primary and community mental health services had improved, with the government surpassing its target of seeing 80% of primary care patients within a week. Workforce vacancy rates have also fallen, from 11% in 2022 to 8% in 2025, and the number of people entering mental health and addiction training rose from under 400 in 2023 to 514 in 2025.<\/p>\n

But overall access to specialist services remains below pre-Covid levels, the commission\u2019s chief executive Karen Orsborn told RNZ\u2019s Kate Green<\/a>, and young people who do not live near one of the country\u2019s three dedicated youth facilities are still being admitted to adult wards not well-suited to their needs. Mental Health Minister Matt Doocey told the Herald the report showed New Zealand was \u201cturning a corner\u201d, but acknowledged more work was needed for young people.<\/p>\n

Sorry young, M\u0101ori, Pasifika and disabled people<\/p>\n

According to the report, nearly a quarter of young people reported high or very high levels of psychological distress in the month before the survey, with distress rates significantly elevated among M\u0101ori (22.5%), Pasifika (24%), and disabled people (35.5%). Psychological distress across the general population has more than doubled over the past decade, now affecting around 609,000 people.<\/p>\n

The report found that young people aged 15\u201324 had the highest rate of intentional self-harm hospitalisations \u2013 nearly three times the overall average, at 370 per 100,000 \u2013 and that investment in kaupapa M\u0101ori services had not kept pace with other mental health funding, with unmet need among M\u0101ori rising from 10% to 16% over two years while general rates remained flat. The commission warned that if these disparities were not addressed urgently, mental distress among these groups would continue to grow.<\/p>\n

The seclusion problem<\/p>\n

The report flagged ongoing concerns about the use of seclusion \u2013 isolating people in distress in rooms they cannot leave. M\u0101ori in adult inpatient settings are subjected to seclusion 6.6 times more often than non-M\u0101ori, a disparity the commission described as \u201can ongoing trend\u201d that was moving away from a rights-based approach. In 2024\/25, 755 people were placed in seclusion, the NZ Herald reported \u2013 a practice the Ministry of Health\u2019s own guidelines acknowledged was \u201cnot therapeutic and may be harmful\u201d.<\/p>\n

The commission called on Health NZ to publish a national plan to eliminate seclusion by 2027. The government\u2019s new Mental Health Bill, currently before Parliament, would require the person in charge of a service to report annually on steps taken to eliminate seclusion, and would prohibit the practice entirely for people under 18. \u201cEliminating seclusion is an issue I have been closely looking at since coming into office and one I care strongly about addressing,\u201d Doocey told the Herald. \u201cIn the meantime, I have been very clear that seclusion should be used only as a last resort.\u201d<\/p>\n

Funding questions<\/p>\n

Yesterday on RNZ,\u00a0The Detail reported<\/a>\u00a0that psychiatrists have raised doubts about whether the government\u2019s $100m budget commitment for mental health will address the sector\u2019s real needs. Dr Hiran Thabrew, chair of T\u016b Te Akaaka Roa \u2013 the New Zealand office of the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists \u2013 told RNZ the funding had been made without a comprehensive system plan or up-to-date data. The last adult mental health prevalence study was conducted more than 20 years ago, and without that foundation, \u201cwe\u2019ll just end up paying more for less effective care.\u201d<\/p>\n

The College described the budget spending as piecemeal and reactive, with decisions appearing to be driven by lobbying rather than transparent, planned, and equitable planning. Thabrew was particularly sceptical about the $52m allocated for 20 new inpatient beds, noting that without sufficient workforce to staff them, the money risked going unspent. On the $20m for maternal mental health peer support, he welcomed the intent but warned it wouldn\u2019t be sufficient for women with serious or complex needs, who require specialist clinicians rather than peer workers. He said the sector needed to\u00a0\u201cmove beyond these short-term or piecemeal kind of measures or funding, towards consistent, long-term planning to build and support the mental health system\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Wellbeing Commission\u2019s latest report shows measurable gains in New Zealand\u2019s mental health system \u2013 but the picture…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":484314,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[134,554,555,111,6042,139,69,14465],"class_list":["post-484313","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mental-health","tag-health","tag-mental-health","tag-mentalhealth","tag-new-zealand","tag-newsletter","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-the-bulletin"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/484313","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=484313"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/484313\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/484314"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=484313"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=484313"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=484313"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}