During the month of July Shoalhaven police will be posting a series of articles on how we work to provide policing services to vulnerable members of the community todays information is about our response to those people in our community suffering mental illness. The NSW Police Force continues to focus on providing a world class policing response to those people in our community suffering mental illness. With such initiatives as the Mental Health Intervention Team (MHIT) the NSWPF has been at the forefront of policing and mental health in Australia. NSW Police Force’s continued partnership with NSW Health, other government agencies and non government agencies is already showing significant results in terms of policing. Police will always have a legitimate role to play in managing mental illness in our community, however the primary agency is and should always be NSW Health. It is through continued dialogue and partnerships through our local networks that this close relationship continues to yield results for everyone concerned. The NSW Police Force role in managing the mentally ill in our community is based on the premise of safety for all concerned, and our involvement is based on risk assessment. The Mental Health Intervention Team is now an established name in the NSW Police Force. We are training on average one class per month for frontline police in our four day training program. Our goal is to train 10% of all NSWPF operational police by the end of 2015. There are 13 MHIT trained officers at the Shoalhaven LAC, who are identifiable to the public by their MHIT badges. In addition to our MHIT training we are involved in several NSW Government research projects including Mental Health Frequent Presenters and Mental Health and Cognitive Disability in the NSW Criminal Justice System. The NSW Police Force policy position is outlined in the NSW Emergency Mental Health Memorandum of Understanding (MOU). Supporting the MOU, the NSW Police Force have a network of 80 active Mental Health Contact Officers (one Inspector per Local Area Command) across NSW and these police officers help to ensure the streamlined implementation of the MOU and legislation at a local level. Shoalhaven LACs Mental Health Contact Officer is Inspector Steve Johnson. With four full time staff, the MHIT team contains significant expertise in this complex area of mental health and policing. They are available to assist all operational police. I encourage all relevant stakeholders to look at the Mental Health site and contact the team. Whilst much has been achieved in policing and mental health it is imperative that we continue to drive our agenda of providing a safe and dignified policing response to those suffering a mental illness in the community. This video about the new one day Mental Health Training which police attached to the Shoalhaven LAC completed earlier this year. youtube/watch?v=wB6ZZ_DnbM0
Posted on: Thu, 03 Jul 2014 23:19:10 +0000
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