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

Appendix B
not take into account competing and complementary services, and this limitation must be considered
when interpreting these findings. However, the current formula for centre allocation, which assumes
that all young people have access to a headspace centre if they live within an SA4 or SA3 area that
contains a headspace centre, may not provide equitable access. For example, these regions vary
substantially in both geographic size and youth population. As a result, the distance required to travel
to a headspace centre may be too great to facilitate access for all young people residing in certain
SA4 or SA3 areas despite there being a headspace centre somewhere within the area. In areas with
large youth populations, or a high prevalence of youth mental health problems, access may also
be limited by the capacity of a single headspace centre to service the demand. These issues are
considered in the following chapter.
If the allocation of sites is governed by factors other than weighted youth population (such as
competing and complementary services and lead agency financial resources), these factors need to
be made more explicit in the centre allocation model. DoH and hNO also need to give consideration
to the costs and benefits of a system which records lead agency financial contribution.
Lead agency contribution to occasions of service (as recorded in the hCSA) seems quite low.
However, we have no information about the costs associated with lead agency funded occasions
of service as costs of occasion of service are not recorded on the hCSA. As well as adding cost
of service information to the hCSA, we recommend that the Department and hNO investigate lead
agency contributions to the headspace service model beyond that which is observed in hCSA. This
will provide a better understanding of the overall contribution of non-headspace funds to the service
model than is achievable under the data access limitations of this evaluation.
Evaluation of the current model of centre expansion
Background
The previous section described the potential for national coverage of headspace and the funding
requirements (see Appendix G) to achieve this under the Department of Health’s current allocation
model. This chapter provides an evaluation of the effectiveness of the current centre allocation
model to provide access to headspace services The current definition of access to a headspace
centre, as defined by the current centre allocation model, and the costs associated with achieving
national coverage under this model are described in Part One, Centre Expansion under the Current
headspace Centre Allocation Model.
The current centre allocation model does not take into account factors such as the geographic size
of the area, the travel times associated with accessing headspace centre services, and the number
of young people who require mental health services within the area. In addition, the current funding
arrangement of headspace grants for individual headspace centres places limits on the extent to
which centres can vary their service type and service volume to meet client demand. The headspace
grant amount is fixed for the period of the grant agreement (typically 3 or 4 years), and includes
set amounts for centre establishment in Year One and normal operations thereafter. When nearing
completion of the grant term the Lead Agency enters negotiations with the Department and hNO for
contract renewal. If successful, the process repeats itself, without establishment funding. This funding
arrangement effectively places a cap on individual centre resources as the headspace grant amount
is agreed in advance and is fixed in contract across the grant term. As described in Part One, there
is some flexibility provided by leveraging headspace services off Lead Agency contributions, but
these contributions are likely to be variable across sites and Lead Agencies. For reasons described
in Part One, information about the size and nature of Lead Agency contributions is unavailable to
the evaluation team. These features of the current centre allocation model limit equity of access to
headspace centres. Hence the need to investigate what may be possible in terms of youth access to
headspace services under a range of alternative centre allocation models.
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