Is headspace making a difference to young people’s lives?

Appendix B
Department’s access criteria as set in the current centre allocation model.
While the current expansion model determines area priority based on weighted youth population,
which takes into account socioeconomic disadvantage and remoteness, the following analysis
refers to unweighted total youth population unless otherwise specified. Therefore, once the recently
announced Round 8 centres are in operation, 80% of Australia’s young people will be deemed to
have access to a headspace centre using the definition of access supported by the current centre
expansion model.
Hypothetical expansion beyond 100 centres
Applying the methodology used to determine centre location in the first eight rounds of headspace
allocation, the current allocation process was taken to the point of national coverage in a series of
hypothetical rounds. The results of these analyses are presented in in Appendix G.
In order to complete these analyses in direct accordance with the current allocation model as used
by the Department, the algorithm used to derive the weighted youth population is applied. The
weighting algorithm used was the product of the SEIFA and ARIA weights. These weights mean that
greater priority is given to areas with high levels of disadvantage and those in regional, remote and
very remote areas, when compared to an unweighted model which allocates centres based on youth
population alone. SEIFA and ARIA weights are provided in Table B2 and Table B3 respectively.
Table B2 Weighting applied for socioeconomic disadvantage
SEIFA decile
Weight
1 – Most disadvantaged 1.5
2 1.4
3 1.3
4 1.2
5 1.1
6 1
7 1
8 1
9 1
10 – Least disadvantaged 1
Table B3 Weighting applied for remoteness
Remoteness classification
Weight
Major cities 1
Inner regional 1
Outer regional 1.5
Remote 2
Very remote 2
In order to investigate the impact of the current centre allocation model beyond its existing level of
implementation, we have allocated hypothetical centre locations by extending the current centre
allocation model. This involves extrapolating the methodology used for the last actual round of
allocation (Round 8) and applying it to all remaining SA3 and SA4 level geographies that do not
currently support a headspace centre.
To do so, we have estimated the weighted youth population in all capital city SA4s and non-capital
city SA3s. This modelling showed that there were 95 SA3s/4s which contained a headspace centre
and 96 SA3s/SA4s which did not yet have a headspace centre after Round 8. Allocating 94 centres
across 6 rounds would achieve full national coverage under the operational definition used in this
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