Doctors are warning the state's mental health system is at breaking point, with one in two public hospital psychiatrists threatening to quit their jobs over chronic understaffing. They're demanding the government recruit and retain more specialists by bringing pay into line with other states.
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00:00Public hospital psychiatrists care for patients in crisis, including cases of self-harm, psychosis
00:08and paranoia, but about a third of positions remain unfilled in a system the government
00:13says is world class.
00:16The lived reality of those working in this psychiatry workforce is that at best it's
00:21mediocre and most people say it's dangerous.
00:25Mental health campaigner Sharon Grocott experienced the effects of short-staffing when her daughter
00:29Amber was admitted with schizophrenia.
00:32They had to wait more than 12 hours in emergency and then deal with a revolving door of temporary
00:37doctors or locums who are used to fill gaps.
00:41We would have a different opinion, every time we'd have to repeat our story, we'd start
00:45all over again, it was really hard to build trust.
00:49The short-staffings become so serious that half the state's public hospital psychiatrists
00:53have submitted resignations to their union and are threatening to send them to the government
00:58unless their pay matches other states, which are offering up to 30% more.
01:03It is absolutely demoralising when you can't provide the care that you are trained to provide
01:09because of how under-resourced the system is.
01:13We want to sit down and negotiate but 30% even for a relatively small number of public
01:18sector workers is more than our ability to pay.
01:21The doctors' union says a pay rise would make financial sense, arguing that competitive
01:26salaries would not only help fill scores of vacant positions, they'd save the government
01:31a fortune in locum fees.
01:33Even if patients can afford them, private hospitals rarely treat the most complex and
01:37critical cases.
01:39The public system is it, so for us that's the only port of call.
01:44And doctors say it's a system worth fighting for.