Green Party of New Brunswick, Fredericton, NB

Our mental health care system continues to struggle to provide timely access to diagnostic and treatment services, with only 3% of the provincial health budget dedicated to mental health. We must place the same priority on providing accessible and effective mental health care as we do on treating physical illness and disease. When it comes to mental illness, hospitals are not the gateway to treatment. We need a different system to provide mental health care that builds on our community mental health centres to provide outreach and follow-up, particularly to fill the biggest gap in our current system – youth mental health. At the same time I want to acknowledge all those who are working hard within and outside our mental health care system to bring about the improvements in service that are so urgently needed