Mr Speaker, I support this motion and thank my parliamentary colleagues for their continued advocacy and ideas to improve the mental health and well-being of our people. As mentioned by SPS Rahayu, the Tiered Care Model is the foundation of our National Mental Health and Well-being Strategy. I will further elaborate on some of our initiatives to implement the Tiered Care Model. We will:
a) One, set up first-stop touchpoints to facilitate help-seeking;
b) Two, train frontline social service professionals; and
c) Three, develop a practice guide to enhance service integration between health and social service providers.
Set up first-stop touchpoints
2 Mr Speaker, we have a vibrant and thriving mental health services landscape today, with over 200 different services available, including hotlines, websites and in-person services. These services target different levels of mental health needs, from community-led mental health promotion, self-help and peer support at Tier 1, to the most intensive level of care in hospitals and specialist clinics at Tier 4 of our Tiered Care Model.
3 There are also many ground-up initiatives across sectors, such as those under the Beyond the Label Collective, to address the mental health and well-being needs of our people and reduce stigma. I thank all for your passion, determination and for rising to the occasion. These services and ground-up initiatives serve as the foundation of our work, building upon the larger National Mental Health and Well-being Strategy.
4 In spite of our vibrant mental health services landscape, we have heard feedback, however, that help seeking can be overwhelming as many do not know where, when and how to seek help. This is a key issue for us, as there remains a treatment gap – many who need help are not getting the help that they need, and far too many get help far later than they should. The complex web of services available can indeed have the unintended consequences of deterring help-seeking.
5 We want to make it easier for anyone to seek help. No going at it alone or figuring out your way by yourself. We will set up first-stop touchpoints; essentially “go-to places” for mental health support. Our first-stop touchpoints will identify clients’ mental health needs and provide the appropriate service. This can mean relevant information, immediate mental health support and intervention, or referrals. We want to make sure that individuals with mental health conditions are well supported, especially when they have taken the crucial first step to reach out for help.
6 Our first-stop touchpoints will include:
a) One, a number to call or text. We will set up a new National Mental Health Hotline and Text Service by 2025, that will connect callers and texters to the most appropriate support or services to meet their needs. For example, callers and texters with no or minimal mental health needs and want to learn well-being skills can be referred to Well-being Circles in the community. On the other end of the spectrum, those with suicidal tendencies may be connected to the Samaritans of Singapore’s Hotline and Care Text for support.
b) Two, a digital platform, such as Mindline or MindSG. It does not matter which resource users visit first, since both link to each other. Both websites contain curated content by mental health experts, self-assessment tools and links to other resources, including our in-person touchpoints for mental health support. Mindline also has an online forum named “Ask a Therapist” where users can engage with verified professionals and a Wysa AI-enabled chatbot where users can share their emotions safely and anonymously without the fear of being judged, anywhere and anytime.
c) Third, a place to seek help. We will build up and promote in-person touchpoints, including community mental health teams such as Community Outreach Teams as in-person first-stop touchpoints, so that the public knows where to seek help. With this move, we hope that the public will become more aware of the existence of the many social service agencies in our community providing psychotherapy and emotional support, and not just clinics and hospitals.
Upskill frontline social service professionals
7 While first-stop touchpoints are more specialised in delivering mental health services, we also want to equip 1,500 frontline social service professionals with basic mental health capabilities. In the course of their work, social service professionals often encounter clients with unmet mental health needs. In fact, many may not themselves recognise that they are in need of mental health support. For our 500 frontline staff across our Social Service Offices (SSOs), we plan to train them in Psychological First Aid.
8 We also intend to train another 1,000 frontline social service professionals to be capable of identifying mental health concerns, provide casework and counselling, and refer clients to appropriate services. These social service professionals will be trained by 2030.
Develop a practice guide to enhance service integration
9 Directing clients to appropriate services at the get-go does not mean the job is done. An individual’s mental health needs can change over time. To provide a seamless care experience for clients, service providers across the social service and health sectors need to work ever closer together. Today, different providers have different screening, assessment, collaboration, referral, IT and data-sharing practices. To provide a more seamless experience for those seeking mental health services, the Taskforce brought together professionals from both social service and healthcare sectors to develop a practice guide, which we aim to launch by the end of this year. The practice guide will standardise:
a) One, common mental health screening and assessment tools – essentially, common language and tools to help service providers identify their clients’ level of mental health needs;
b) Two, common collaboration and referral workflows – to guide service providers to determine which service provider to refer their client to, depending on their level of mental health needs and other factors such as age, cost, and how they can collaborate to serve the best interests of the client; and
c) Three, common IT system and data sharing guidelines – to streamline referral processes while safeguarding and addressing clients’ concerns about confidentiality.
10 The practice guide will help better ensure that clients are referred to and receive mental health resources or interventions appropriate to their needs. When their needs change, the support for them can be adjusted accordingly, that is, stepped up to higher-intensity services or stepped down to lower-intensity services, as needed.
11 While there are good examples of collaboration and coordination across social service and healthcare sectors today, not all cases are handled in a systematic and consistent manner. To help raise overall practice standards and the experience for those seeking help, the practice guide will clearly lay out the kinds of services different agencies in the social and health sector should provide and how they should work with one another to serve clients with mental health needs. At the end of the day, it is all about serving individuals with mental health support needs better.
Mr Speaker, in Mandarin please.
12 议长先生，
我们希望任何在心理健康这方面有需要的国人，在寻求帮助的旅途中，不需要孤独地摸索，并因此而感到迷惘或害怕。寻求帮助的过程并不应该是孤独寂寞的！
对此，我们将设立第一站接触点，帮助有需要的国人找到适当的心理健康服务。这包括，（第1）可拨打或发送简讯的热线， （第2）可浏览，并自助的综合网站，以及（第3）可供国人寻求帮助的“心理健康站”。
此外，社会服务专业人士经常会在工作的过程中遇到有心理健康需求的人士。其中，许多人往往也没有意识到他们自己心理健康这方面的需要。对此，我们将为 1,500 名社会服务专业人士提供基本心理健康服务培训。
最后，我们也将制定一套‘实践指南’，以加强“医疗与社会服务”等领域的专业人士在筛查、评估、转介、IT 和数据共享等方面，更无缝地配合与合作。最终的目的只有一个，那就是：为有心理健康需求的国人提供更完善，并以他们为中心的服务。
Conclusion
13 Mr Speaker, our mission at hand is one that is salient and pressing. Our national mental health strategy lays the foundation and gives us direction, so we can collectively get to a better place in terms of our mental health. Beyond plans, policies and programmes, perhaps more importantly so, we need a further shift in mindsets surrounding mental health and people with mental health conditions. Much has been done, but more work remains. With the help of Members of this Chamber from both sides of the aisle and beyond, I have every confidence that Singapore can be a paragon where stigma surrounding mental health is a thing of the past, and where help-seeking is well-facilitated. With that, I support the motion.