Mental Health Nurses have serious concerns about the safety of their patients, the public, their colleagues and themselves when police changes to emergency 111 calls come into effect on Monday, New Zealand Nurses Organisation (NZNO) Tōpūtanga Tapuhi Kaitiaki o Aotearoa says.

On Monday 4 November police will begin a phased withdrawal from most mental health emergency call-related work including attending callouts, waiting with patients in Emergency Departments and transporting patients to mental health facilities.

NZNO Mental Health Nurses Section chair Helen Garrick says mental health nurses often need to go into people’s homes and in the past have had the back-up of police.

"It will now be up to nurses to prove someone is a serious danger to themselves or others before they get police support. This will delay urgent assessments and creates the potential to endanger the patient, the mental health workers, and possibly, the public.

"Nurses don’t have the legislative power to restrain people in the community or the tools to keep themselves or others safe when dealing with a psychotic or drug induced illness. We fear these changes will lead to more threats and assaults on nurses," Helen Garrick says.

The already stretched mental health workforce doesn’t have the capacity - or the skills and tools - to pick up this extra work safely, she says.

"We are very short staffed across acute mental health services, crisis services and forensic (criminal justice-related) services. Te Whatu Ora assumes there is the workforce to pick up this work but mental health workers are struggling to maintain their current services.

"There has been no discussion with frontline staff about the potential resourcing and changes required. NZNO has called for these changes to be stopped until Te Whatu Ora can reassure patients and nurses there are processes in place to make them safe.

"Changes like this require years of planning and workforce development. But Te Whatu Ora has only just begun putting plans in place for the health sector to deal with these changes despite police indicating since August 2023 they are coming," Helen Garrick says.

The United Kingdom model - which the change from a police to a mental health response is based on - was phased in gradually throughout the country with significant investment in purpose-built crisis hubs and hospital-based suites, but there had been no additional investment here, she says.