Shadow Minister for Youth, Amanda Rishworth, and Federal Member for Dobell, Emma McBride, held a youth roundtable with local youths at Lake Haven’s Gravity Youth Centre on November 13.
Run by Central Coast Council Youth Services, the Gravity Youth Centre hosts recreation and social activities for young people and is co-located with ‘the Y’ and Headspace Lake Haven.
The latest in a series of similar roundtables taking place around Australia, Rishworth said that COVID-19 concerns dominated the discussion.
“What I’m hearing from forums like this right across the country is that many young people are really concerned about disruption to studies, losing hours at work and decreased mental wellbeing.
“I’m calling on the government to implement a COVID-19 Youth Recovery Strategy that sets some goals and lays out how we can achieve them,” Rishworth said.
“Any youth strategy should be genuinely co-designed with young people and I’m here today to make sure that the issues I’m focusing on are the ones most important to young people,” she added.
During discussion, McBride spoke about the government’s election commitment to establish a Headspace satellite site at Wyong.
“I have raised the government’s commitment to establish Headspace Wyong in Parliament because it’s urgent and young people in our community need support now.
“Today (November 13) I heard from young people in crisis being bounced between services and waiting weeks for the help that they need right now.”
“It has been 17 months since Headspace Wyong was first announced.”
“The Prime Minister says mental health is a top priority, so, I again call on the Prime Minster and the Minister for Health to honour their commitment to the young people on the Coast and fund Headspace Wyong,” McBride said.
Source:
Press release, Nov 13
Andrew Scott, Office of Emma McBride MP