Beyond our daily support, Mind works to change how society sees mental health. This can mean advocating to ensure equity, justice, and people’s rights. 

Driving systemic change through influence and effective advocacy is one of Mind’s strategic goals. Our advocacy agenda is informed by the people we support and what matters most to them. We combine data with lived experience and our own expertise to develop policy solutions at the state and national levels.  

In practice, this means our work involves:  

  • Policy analysis and evidence-based policy development  
  • Using research to develop and advocate for best-practice mental health services and for new policy solutions  
  • Public awareness raising, campaign development and execution  
  • Coalition and network building, including in partnership with the Australian Psychosocial Alliance  
  • Gathering insights from our staff delivering services, the Lived Experience Advisory Teams at Mind and colleagues with lived experience to inform our advocacy 
  • Submitting insights and recommendations to inquiries and reviews. 

 

Our strategic priorities

We are committed to advocating for: 

  1. Supported housing for people with mental health challenges 
  2. Coordinated systemic reform, with a focus on psychosocial supports  
  3. Community mental health models that have lived experience embedded in the design and delivery 
  4. Pricing, commissioning and funding cycles that ensure high quality, value-for-money, responsive, viable and sustainable delivery of mental health services. 
  5. Advocating for the social and emotional wellbeing of First Nations people across Australia, and the critical importance of having culturally safe, trauma-informed mental health and suicide prevention services that are deeply connected with First Nations lived and living experience.  

 

Our advocacy news

Our advocacy function has been growing since 2017 and is part of the Strategy, Engagement and Housing Transformation division. 

Every month, our Executive Director of Strategy, Engagement and Housing Transformation Nicola Ballenden publishes an update about our advocacy activities. 

To discuss our advocacy work, please contact the Policy & Strategy team at [email protected] 

 

Our submissions and media

 

Our campaigns

Access Denied: Psychosocial disability and the NDIS

As part of the Australian Psychosocial Alliance (APA) – a national alliance of leading mental health support organisations – Mind did extensive advocacy in 2025 for better representation and support within the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS). Our report, Access Denied: Psychosocial disability and the NDIS documents the impacts of corrosive changes that are creating invisible barriers and inequity in accessing the NDIS. Access Denied draws on first-hand insights from consumers, participants, carers and others involved in the mental health system, as well as NDIS statistics and APA organisational data.  

Our Access Denied campaign and reach involved: 

  • Meeting with 42 Members of the federal Parliament to raise our concerns (almost 20% of the whole Australian parliament), and Members of Parliament in every state and territory 
  • Radio, print and online coverage across the country to an audience of around 51.5 million people 
  • 39,000+ views of APA organisations’ posts on social media about the report  
  • Acknowledgement of our concerns about NDIS access by people with psychosocial disability in communiqué from the national Health & Mental Health Ministers meeting 

Importantly, the campaign led to the NDIA undertaking an internal access review to assess factors that may be contributing to declining access rates for people with psychosocial disability. 

The full report can be found on the APA’s website here.