The ACT government will start work on an Office of Mental Health within the first 100 days of government as youth groups call for the assembly to implement the findings of an inquiry into youth suicide rates and self-harm.
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The power-sharing agreement brokered between the ACT Greens and Labor will deliver 20 more school-based pyschologists and bolster community-based youth counselling, as well as installing Shane Rattenbury as the territory's first minister for mental heath.
Mr Rattenbury said the Office of Mental Health would coordinate services and stop people falling through the gaps, identified by an independent panel into the prevalence of youth suicide last year.
"We have heard from the community, and from health workers, that there are gaps in our mental system and long waiting lists for child and adolescent mental health," Mr Rattenbury said.
Emma Robertson, director of the Youth Coalition of the ACT, welcomed the increased focus on mental health as the system "doesn't have the flexibility to cope with any increase in demand".
But she said the problems identified by the panel, including poor data collection and blown-out wait times for specialist services, need to be addressed.
She called on the ACT government to use the office to implement the findings of the inquiry, which included improving data collecting on youth suicide and self-harm.
"We have a concern around the fact there can still be a six- to eight-week wait for assessment sometimes and we know from all of the research around help seeking behaviour that unfortunately that's too long a time period and when people do actually reach out for help we need to be able to respond in some way pretty quickly," Ms Robertson said.
Meanwhile, a new report into youth suicide found more people aged between 15 and 24 died by suicide last year than any other means.
Despite more awareness and strategies from government to prevent youth suicide, the Orygen Raising The Bar for Youth Suicide Prevention report showed suicides among young Australians were at their highest levels in 10 years.
Nationally twice as many women aged 15 to 19 took their own lives in 2015 than in 2005 and suicides have also increased among young people under the age of 14 years,
Nine people aged 15 to 24 died by suicide in the ACT last year. Eight people aged five to 17 took their own lives between 2011 and 2016.
Overall suicide accounted for about 2 per cent of deaths in the ACT last year and Lifeline Canberra chief executive Carrie-Ann Leeson said the rate was "probably the worst it's ever been in Canberra".
"The demand on our services grows exponentially every year. We've broken the record for calls answered for 15 months consecutively and it's still not enough; we only get to 85 per cent of our callers nationally," Ms Leeson told Fairfax Media in September.
The government will start consultation with mental health service providers and experts in the new year.
If you need help or support contact, Lifeline: 13 11 14, beyondblue: 1300 22 4636, Kids Helpline: 1800 55 1800 (24/7 crisis support), or headspace: 1800 650 890 www.headspace.org.au.
