Quarterly Update: Reconciliation Action Plan

At the end of March this year, we gave an update about progress we have been making in working to accomplish the goals laid out in our Reflect Reconciliation Action Plan (RAP), which is CoMHWA’s first ever RAP.

We have been keeping momentum going since then, and so far, we have completed 29 planned goals (deliverables), have 9 in progress, and 3 that we will commence in the next few months.

Here are some of our key achievements since the last update:

• We have refreshed membership of the RAP working group, and have started evaluation including surveys to see how effective activities and trainings we have run have been for our staff.
• Our Systemic Advocacy team published a briefing paper on the Gayaa Dhuwi Declaration, which is a set of principles for ensuring Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people have equitable access to culturally appropriate approaches to mental health alongside clinical interventions. This was circulated in our Newsletter. Our Systemic Advocacy team are now working on research to put together a literature review on systemic racism, and its effect on mental health and social and emotional wellbeing for Aboriginal people.
• Our Community Engagement Officer – Aboriginal Mental Health has now convened several meetings of the Aboriginal Lived Experience Advisory Group (ALEAG), ALEAG, and the State Aboriginal Mental Health Network (SAMHN), to build understanding of Aboriginal Social and Emotional Wellbeing issues.
• We have continued to engage Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander suppliers; gifts for LLP leaders for National Volunteer Week were sourced from an Aboriginal-owned and run company in Darwin called Aboriginal Bush Traders and the tea boxes were painted by Noongar artist Seantelle Walsh. We recently got lanyards for CoMHWA from Yarn marketplace and from Teaching Tools, which does collaborations with Aboriginal artists.
• We have participated in events for National Reconciliation Week, attending a screening of short film The Grey Line locally in Belmont, and we participated in the Walk for Reconciliation. We sponsored a banner for National Reconciliation Week, which was displayed in Yagan Square, and we now have that banner displayed in our new training room.
• In early July, we celebrated NAIDOC Week by attending a flag raising ceremony at the City of Belmont, and by hosting our own event here at CoMHWA where we heard from fabulous guest speaker, Indigenous Lived Experience Nyungar Advocate, Joanne Kahn.
• As part of our NAIDOC week event, we launched the Moorditj Minds podcast, which is dedicated to exploring Aboriginal Mental Health services in WA. You can now listen to the first episode on Spotify or on Apple Podcasts.
• We have engaged Kaala Barna, an Aboriginal owned consultancy service here in WA, to review our training materials to ensure they are relevant and culturally appropriate for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.

As we draw close to the end in achieving goals we set for this year in our current plan, we will be reporting to Reconciliation Australia about the impact of our RAP activities and looking to plan our next phase of implementation!

Dr Melissa Russell
RAP Champion