Instead, Professor McGorry called for a massive increase in government spending on mental health, to 13 per cent from 7 per cent of the $150 billion health budget over time, which he said would "pay for itself many times over". Professor Patrick McGorry says mental health is 'missing in action' in the election campaign. Credit:Eddie Jim "What's at stake here .. . is the momentum and direction of mental health reform, which has been badly lost since the last election," he told the National Press Club in Canberra. Professor McGorry also warned that primary health networks, an Abbott government initiative to make health spending more efficient by devolving power to regional bodies, lacked accountability and were susceptible to poor decision-making. "The money has been cast into this flexible funding pool. Programs that are scientifically-based have been defunded," he said.

"The people that are making decisions in the [Health] Department about what should be supported and what's efficient don't have the right knowledge and they're ignoring the evidence." But Health Minister Sussan Ley said the Turnbull government was implementing reforms urged by the National Mental Health Commission's review, which did not recommend more money but more effective allocation of the "substantial" existing funding. That was exactly what the government was doing, Ms Ley said. "We promised to make mental health a first-term priority and, from next month, we are delivering the changes some of this nation's top mental health experts recommended," she said. Professor McGorry called for the federal government to guarantee long-term funding for programs such as Headspace, which will have to compete in a tender process from 2018.