Each day of the National Suicide Prevention Conference, we’ll be sharing five key insights from the sessions.
Day 1 – Tuesday 2 May, 2023
- Joe Williams, Founder of The Enemy Within and our indigenous lived experience keynote speaker said we need to stop talking about how beautifully everything is going and start to do things differently because what we’re doing isn’t working and are only band aid solutions. “Our people are dying, and we don’t need glossy magazines to fix our people”.
- The Hon. Emma McBride, Assistant Minister for Mental Health and Suicide Prevention spoke on the importance of whole-of-government action. She said we need a broad and compassionate approach to suicide prevention and that, in order to prevent suicides, there needs to be real change in attitudes, policy and practice.
- Melissa McIntosh MP, Shadow Minister for Mental Health and Suicide Prevention said the alarm bells couldn’t be ringing any louder. We should be more aware of what could come given the cost-of-living pressures we’re all facing. She also said they hope to be seeing some strong commitments from the Federal Government in the upcoming budget for the suicide prevention and mental health sector.
- Peta Dampney, From Me To You Consulting, “My lived experience is bigger than yours” – we do not need this in the lived experience space. We need to understand that everyone’s lived experience is unique.
- Dr Nerida Volker, lived experience advocate said we have a long way to go in upskilling teachers and school communities in how we talk about suicide and support young people in a safe and helpful way.
