Australia's first Mental Health Minister has faced a grilling from young people, who told him Australia should have more access to youth mental health services and better education to reduce stigma.

Mark Butler joined young people aged 15-25 in Sydney last night in an online forum covering topics ranging from suicide prevention to psychologist waiting lists.

Participants were up front and candid with Mr Butler, who is spending December conducting 14 mental health forums around Australia.

"At my school I didn't know anything about mental illness. I didn't learn anything about it," a commenter from Sydney said.

"Unfortunately it was through my dad having depression that I actually learnt about mental health. And even then I had no idea.

"Later on, when my father died [committed suicide] and I was facing depression, my school had a support network but they didn't understand what I was going through. It was like they weren't educated on mental health and they were just guessing."

The Government has limited programs in place in primary schools and high schools to raise awareness, and Mr Butler said more work would be done.

"Discussing schools is a great point, particularly educating young people. There are plans, but we are identifying this as a real challenge," he wrote on the forum.

Mr Butler said the main concerns he heard from the participants were negative perceptions of mental illness and a lack of education in schools.

"Young people encounter the stigma around mental illness at schools, when they visit doctors and with friends and family," he said.

"They strongly think mental health should be a part of the school curriculum just as much as physical education or mainstream health education."

Three quarters of mental illness begins before the age of 25 and experts say only one in four young people experiencing mental health problems receives professional help.

Getting help online

Online youth mental health services run by BeyondBlue, HeadSpace and ReachOut have been developed in recent years to plug gaps in mainstream services.

The host of the forum was ReachOut, a website that offers online support, information and a variety of discussion forums for young people affected by mental health issues.

Ashleigh Husband, a 19-year-old Brisbane youth ambassador for ReachOut, said she travelled to Sydney to be part of the forum.

"I've had a lot of friends with mental health issues and it's through that experience that I am quite passionate about mental health," she said.

"I've had friends with depression, anxiety, psychosis, schizophrenia, bipolar, and I've also had friends dealing with suicidal thoughts and self harm."

Ms Husband knew nothing about ReachOut until she turned to the internet to try and find a way to help a struggling friend. While she was searching for ways of treating depression and anxiety she stumbled across the website.

"On ReachOut, young people can control how much they seek help for their problems or how much they talk about it in the online environment," she said.

"They can also stay anonymous and it's flexible, it's available 24/7 and ultimately it's also relevant to young people and it's really meeting their needs."

HeadSpace CEO Chris Tanti says online services can help young people who might be reluctant to see a doctor about their problems.

"Online mental health services enable young people to access help anonymously, at no cost," he said.

"E-mental health services provide an option for young people to get help they may not otherwise seek ... and young people who have a good experience online may be more likely to seek help face-to-face."

This sentiment was shared by a number of forum participants, who said the mental health system was often intimidating and scary.

"As a young person I can feel really out of place at somewhere that has more adults," a commenter from Perth said.

"I see my psychiatrist at a specialist centre and the majority of people there are older adults and I feel very out of place. Also, it can be reassuring knowing that the people you are seeing have experience with young people and the issues we face."

Mr Butler says the Government has committed significant funds to the field of online mental health support.

"One of the things we want to do is pull the various services together and use that money well and build on good platforms that currently exist," he said.

"Some of the things that are being discussed in Australia now are not just using the internet for information and awareness, but also considering some of the experience in the UK at using web-based and telephonic technology to use it for low-intensity therapy as well."

Regional and rural

Participants on the forum also urged Mr Butler to find solutions to the lack of resources in regional areas.

Sarah, a young person who made the trip to Sydney to be at the forum, said it was extremely frustrating trying to see a psychologist or psychiatrist outside major cities.

"Once you get the confidence [to seek help], you have to wait for six months to see someone," she said.

Mr Butler said there had been some real improvements in regional services, but he was realistic about the work that still needed to be done.

"Medicare funding for psychologists and social workers and occupational therapists to provide therapy and to be able to bill under Medicare, we know that has lifted treatment rates in rural and regional Australia very significantly," he said.

"Some of the things raised tonight were about the availability of acute services like in-patient hospital services. That is always going to be challenging in terms of having the bricks and mortar around for mental health beds and also workforce. There's no easy way through that."

Ashleigh Husband said it was great that Mr Butler had taken the time to talk to young people about what they thought of the mental health system.

"There are so many decisions made about young people with very little thought to what their ideas and opinions are and I think it's really nice to see a bit of a change in that," she said.