[Greens-Media] Making our own boundaries

[Manderson, Roland]

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ACT Greens MLA Deb Foskey MEDIA RELEASE
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Fri 25 Aug 06


Making our own boundaries

As part of the ACT budget debate late night, ACT Greens MLA Deb Foskey released a public discussion paper on supporting people with mental illness - 'Making our own boundaries, not living in your walls'. 

"This paper was written for the Greens by Fiona Tito Wheatland."  

"It argues that models of support that focus on the person not their illness, and looks to empower them to make real choices in their life, deliver much better outcomes, and can be significantly cheaper to run" Dr Foskey said today.

"The ACT Government has argued that we need to bring the cost of government services down.  At the same time, the need to increase support for people with mental illness is widely accepted."

"Fiona has written a discussion paper which really point us towards a better system. She looks carefully at the model developed in Trieste in Italy and the principles that underpin it."

"The Trieste area is a similar sized jurisdiction to Canberra, and the system it has had in place for many years can teach us a lot."

"I have distributed the paper widely to the mental health community, and hope to sit down with the Health Minister or her staff to see how we can move forward with this plan."

"It's better for people and better for the community" Dr Foskey said.


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Fiona Tito Wheatland has a long term professional and personal involvement in the field.  Statutory appointments include as an Official Visitor and Chair of the ACT Community and Health Rights Advisory Council, as well as an involvement in the Mental Health Consumer Association and 5 years as Chair of the ACTCOSS Health Policy Advisory Committee. She is presently a PhD scholar at ANU in patient safety.


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Roland Manderson   Media Advisor
ACT   Greens    MLA  Deb  Foskey  
Legislative Assembly for the ACT 
ph(02)62050551      m 0412241379
====== www.debfoskey.com ======= 
  
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