Key advocacy article in The Age

The Age today features a full-length opinion piece by AAPi, advocating for an increase in the Medicare rebate to ensure psychologists are more accessible to all Australians.

The key points made in the article are:

• Raising the Medicare rebate to $150 for the clients of ALL psychologists.
• We are calling for provisional psychologists to have the ability to provide services under Medicare (with adequate supervision). We want to support early career psychologists, their employers and increase access to psychological services.
• AAPi is offering tangible solutions to our mental health crisis now.
• It is essential that Medicare is appropriately funded. If the Federal Government is not willing to act on this now, we are calling on the Victorian Government to reallocate some of the funding in the current budget to provide this support for Victorians. We will call on other State and Territory Governments to do the same.
• We are asking for the ability for Australians who need support to access psychologists without the need of a mental health diagnosis or referral.

The prominent piece has already been widely shared and can be viewed here. Please feel free to share the article, and add your comments to it. This media coverage adds weight to the importance of the reforms to mental health care that we are advocating for on your behalf.

I would also like to take a moment to remind you that as a member association, we are reliant on membership fees to fund our services and advocacy work. Support from our members has been instrumental in all we have been able to achieve and the tremendous growth of AAPi. It is essential that all psychologists have a voice as well as adequate and strong representation for the issues that matter most. We still have so much more to do and it is a critical time for all psychologists to join together. Now is the time to support us, so we can continue to support you.