“Every day there are probably 2.5 million people who take a train journey and unfortunately five or six percent of all suicides have been occurring on the rail network,” he said. “So by putting forward all these posters, people who are troubled or need some help can do exactly what the message says and pause for a moment before making a call, because there is someone who can help.” The campaign, which was first launched in Victoria following a successful study by the University of Melbourne, has proven to effectively increase help-seeking behaviour. Mr Herbert said statistics showed 78 per cent of people who saw the campaign around the stations indicated it increased their likelihood of seeking help from Lifeline. “A lot of them have registered the importance of Lifeline and said that if they were in need, they would use it,” he said.

Loading “We’ve also experimented with extending the campaign onto social media and we’re getting a 98 per cent completion of people who said that if they were in need, they would use it.” WA Public Transport Authority director of corporate communications David Hynes said while there weren’t a high number of suicide fatalities on WA rails, it still had a vast impact on the system. “It not only affects the family of the deceased but also our train drivers, our station staff and our first responders,” he said. “So it is an issue we are interested in doing everything we can to address, not just for the social aspect but for the impact it has on our own people.”

Mr Hynes said some drivers had even been involved in multiple fatalities. “It’s very distressing for them and for the first responders, which is why we have psychologists on call 24/7,” he said. “There are some drivers who can take on counselling and days off and come back to work but a majority of them are too traumatised to return and sometimes have to give up their career.” However, Mr Hynes said double the number of attempted suicides in WA were prevented by transit officers. “Every month we have a couple of people who are pulled back from the brink by our officers who are trained to spot people who are mentally unbalanced or distressed,” he said.

Mr Herbert said the rail industry had also been using CCTV to prevent incidents. “We’re able to see everything that’s happening from the train control centres so we can notice people who show any untoward behaviour and have our staff intervene,” he said. Along with calls to Lifeline’s helpline, Mr Herbert also hoped to provide texting as a method of contact. “I’m sure parents and adults would call but young people these days would probably prefer to text because there is more of a privacy element to it,” he said. “But there is a pretty substantial cost in being able to answer all those texts, so we’re looking at how to fund that and how we’re going to move to a more technology-oriented approach.”