🗣️2025 Youth Mental Health Forum – Key Messages from Anne Hollonds– National Children’s Commissioner
🧒🏽 Make Children a National Priority
- Appoint a Minister for Children
- Children & youth should be central to National Cabinet discussions
đź“ś Follow International Standards
- Australia lags behind the 1990 UN Convention on the Rights of the Child
🛑 Stop Locking Up Children
- Prison isn’t the answer
- Behaviours = symptoms of deeper issues
🧠Prevention is Key
- Adopt a public health approach
- Support early intervention, not punishment
🏛️ Break Down Silos
- Ministries are disconnected
- Real reform needs joined-up government
đź©ş Address Unmet Needs
- Kids face:
- Undiagnosed mental health issues
- Domestic & sexual violence
- Drug use, school disengagement
🏡 What Kids Say They Need:
- A safe home
- A community to belong to
- Food on the table
- Sport & recreation
- Free, accessible transport
🆓 ➤ Make sport free for all children
📝 Kids’ Message to Leaders:
“Do something. We’ve told you what we need.”
