Emails detail Suicide Prevention Office political storm aftermath
Emails between officials detail the aftermath of the Suicide Prevention Office episode, which sparked a political storm.
A proposal to change the Suicide Prevention Office (SPO) left both the Ministry of Health and the minister scrambling last month, spurring Mental Health Minister Matt Doocey to state it would remain open and for the ministry to make an apology for “confusion”.
Meanwhile, on Wednesday, Doocey launched an attack against the Public Service Association, saying to the House it should “apologise for politicising suicide” and for misleading New Zealanders by referring to it closing in a press release.
It continues the back and forth with the union, which last Friday called for the Government to “provide concrete evidence the Office will keep operating as before”, national secretary Duane Leo said.
“Will there actually be a Suicide Prevention Office operating out of the Ministry of Health? The Government made a rapid U-turn on the proposed closure of the Suicide Prevention Office four weeks ago, but the silence since then has been deafening.”
The proposal seen by showed four roles within the unit were proposed to be disestablished – two were already vacant. Another two adviser roles would undergo “minor change”, while it appeared the last two roles were fixed term.
New documents obtained by The Post under the Official Information Act detail tyhe ministry’s proposed suicide prevention model on April 8. It would see the fulltime-equivalent positions (FTE) of the Suicide Prevention Office lift from 5.5 to 6.5. That, however, would be spread across multiple roles, making up 25% of the jobs.
That included 25% of the deputy directorgeneral community and mental health.
Then, within the Mental Health and Addiction Strategy and Policy Business Group, there would be 2.5 FTEs across various roles at 25%. There would also be two roles transferring from the current SPO to the Clinical, Live Experience and System Intelligence Business Group (25% of role).
The ministry has maintained the new proposal would “maintain the current suicide prevention functions and work programme while being organised differently”.
Emails between officials detail what happened after Doocey was taken by surprise last month when he said the closure of the Suicide Prevention Office “has not been raised with me and I have spoken with the director-general of health to make my expectations clear that the office will remain open”.
A few days later, the Ministry of Health released a statement apologising for the
“confusion”. It reiterated Doocey’s expectation the office would remain open and, “as a result, we are developing options to work through with the Minister early next week”. It said the office “has never been a standalone office”, and was a “small team” within the mental health and addiction area.
Since then, Doocey has maintained it is, and was always, staying open, while the
PSA has said uncertainty still clouds its future.
Geoff Short, the ministry’s director for the transformation management office, emailed Doocey’s private secretary Rawinia Thompson on April 4, attaching a draft press release from the PSA.
“It would seem the PSA have a different framing for the changes proposed to the SPO from what we might have wanted people to appreciate,” he wrote.
The next day, the ministry sent the health minister and mental health ministers’ offices a proposed response “to questions from reporters regarding the SPO”.
Part of the response said, “as appropriate, and consistent with the principle of 'no surprises', responsible ministers were informed on the general direction and approach of the Ministry to managing within its budget and the impact of organisational change”.
“The Minister of Mental Health stated that the Suicide Prevention Office should remain open and that the suicide prevention work programme continues.
“Ministerial approval was not sought or required for the organisational change proposals that are the subject of consultation with staff.”
A revised statement was sent on Saturday, April 6, saying “the Minister has stated his expectation that the Suicide Prevention Office remains open”.
“We are currently developing options for the best structure to work through with the Minister early next week.”
Also included was the line – “We acknowledge we did not sufficiently brief the Minister of Mental Health on our proposal for change to ensure he had an opportunity to feed his priorities into our proposed arrangements.”
The next week, when Doocey had received his briefing, an email from ministry deputy director-general (clinical community and mental health) Robyn Shearer to Doocey’s office was sent on the “next steps for the SPO’’.
The email contained details about the 6.5 FTEs proposal included above.
Shearer also suggested “we do a script for him to talk to and we can also work on a wiring diagram to help detail this”.
The email also says, “in the final structure, following consultation and depending on other feedback from staff, we could identify in a box the staff attached to FTEs that are working on the Suicide Prevention Office work programme that would be listed as such under a banner title Suicide Prevention Office”.
“Based on the discussion around options with the Minister for Mental Health today we would not alter the current proposal to staff. We would also not need to communicate any additional proposals to staff to give effect to the Minister’s expectations around the level of resourcing applied to his and our priority around Suicide Prevention.
“The Suicide Prevention Office would remain open and be staffed from partial FTEs from across proposed positions in the new structure.”
“Will there actually be a Suicide Prevention Office operating out of the Ministry of Health? The Government made a rapid U-turn on the proposed closure of the Suicide Prevention Office four weeks ago, but the silence since then has been deafening.” Duane Leo Public Service Association national secretary