Our Vision

All mental health decisions in NSW are informed by consumers who have lived experience.

Our Mission

We represent the voice of NSW mental health consumers to ensure that lived experience is heard and understood by decision-makers, service providers and the community, to effect positive systemic change.

Our Goals

At a systemic level within the mental health system, we:
• Improve the development and implementation of mental health policy
• Ensure consumers are included and represented in all decisions that impact them
• Uphold the human rights of consumers

Our Objectives

# 1 – Increasing consumer engagement within the mental health system
– Respect and dignity for all to enable inclusion
– Embedding lived experience at all levels of the mental health system
– Increasing BEING’s brand profile to reach more consumers
# 2 – Advocating for Mental Health reform
– Advocating for under-served consumers so that all consumers’ needs are included in reform
– Advocating for alternatives to the medical model so that consumers have more choices about their mental health care
– Engaging proactively with the top five issues that
consumers are concerned about
# 3 – Building advocacy capability of consumers
– Supporting consumers’ capability to self-advocate, and participate fully in systemic advocacy
– Establishing a primary network of NSW consumers to enable system reform
# 4 – Ensuring consumers’ needs are heard by decision-makers
– Holding governments accountable in delivering their mental health commitments
– Holding standards-setting bodies accountable in their policy and service development
– Advocating for data transparency, collection and reporting in the sector

Our Guiding Principles

– Creating space for people with lived/living experience of mental health issues to have their voices heard
– Ensuring that recovery-oriented and trauma-informed practice underpins all aspects of BEING’s operations
– The belief that services and a life free of stigma and discrimination are the human rights of every person
– Providing capacity-building opportunities for all people with lived/living experience to grow
– Ensuring that everything that BEING – Mental Health Consumers does is consumer-led

 

BEING – Mental Health Consumers does not offer individual advice. Our role is to advise the State Government; we influence the decisions which will impact on your experience of using mental health services.