— Lived Experience Workforce Initiatives

The Royal Commission into Victoria’s Mental Health System called for people with lived experience to be central to reform planning and delivery. This includes the many programs to expand and better support Victoria’s mental health and wellbeing workforce.

For the first time, the Department of Health is funding peak bodies Tandem and the Victorian Mental Illness Awareness Council(VMIAC) to employ workers as lived experience leads in workforce reform.

Mary O’Hagan has been appointed as the first Victorian Executive Director of Lived Experience to help build Victoria’s new mental health and wellbeing system, ensuring those with experience of the mental health system are at the centre of its reform. The appointment delivers on a key recommendation from the Royal Commission into Victoria’s Mental Health System to employ people with lived experience in leadership positions within the Department.

North Western Melbourne Primary Health Network (NWMPHN) has awarded funding to three initiatives led by cohealth, Foundation House and Orygen to help build peer workforce roles in primary mental health through delivery of low-intensity mental health services.

The providers will use the funding to develop approaches that employ mental health peer workers to provide care and support for people in their communities.