Have you considered politics? The Pathways to Politics Program (Solo)

[00:00:00] Bronwyn: Hey, mental workers. You're listening to the Mental Work podcast, the podcast about working in mental health, for early career mental health workers. I'm your host, Bronwyn Milkins, and today we are talking about politics. Maybe you've felt frustrated by policies that don't reflect the realities of your work, or you've wondered how to create change on a larger scale. If that's you, this episode is for you.

It's not often that we talk about politics on the podcast, but I really wanted to talk about it with you today because last year, I did a thing. I participated in a program called Pathways to Politics for Women. It was a really awesome experience and they currently have applications open for the program this year. I wanted to let you know about what it was like for me, why I applied, what I got out of it, so that you can decide whether you'd like to apply too and even if you don't want to apply or it's not applicable to you, just hearing about how politics intersects with mental health. Politics needs mental health professionals, community advocates, and everyday people who genuinely care about the wellbeing of others, and that's why I applied to this program.  

So let me tell you a bit about the Pathways to Politics program. So it's a non-partisan initiative, meaning that it doesn't side with any particular political party and its chief aim is to increase the number of women in Australian politics. It was first established in Victoria and it's since expanded across all states and territories in Australia, and in 2024, it was the first time that it was Western Australia, which is where I'm based.

It's run in partnerships with leading universities, and it aims to equip women with the knowledge, skills, and confidence to run for office and take on leadership roles in government. In the last eight years, the program has helped hundreds of women run for office and achieved 84 successes nationally. So that means that there's been 84 women who have run in local, state and federal seats, and they've been successful. What makes the program so powerful is that it provides hands-on training in everything from campaign strategy to media skills, while also offering mentorship from experienced political leaders.

As I said in the intro, applications are open until the 1st of May this year, and you can find out more about the program at pathwaystopolitics.org.au. And I'm going to take you a bit through why I applied for the program, my insights and takeaways, and the impact on my future aspirations.

Now as a big nerd, I had been following this program and I've been waiting for it to come to Western Australia for a few years. Now why was I interested in politics in the first place? I think it's because I've always had a deep seated dissatisfaction with the state of politics, and I've always wanted to know how can I assist in creating change? How can I make the biggest impact, the biggest positive impact on the people around me, my community, I guess people more broadly.

How can I do good is the question that I've asked myself for a really long time, and I've done bits and pieces here and there. I have started groups that have been about mental health advocacy. I think there was a part of me that was like, look, if you wanna see change, you need to be part of it, and you need to either be backing people who are running for office who share your values, or you need to be one of those people who do that.

I think also I was becoming increasingly dissatisfied with the state of investment in mental health. Mental health in Australia is vastly underfunded compared to the impact and number of people who experience mental ill health. In short, people with mental health conditions often, more often than not, do not get access to the right supports they need at the right time to be well. And that just doesn't sit right for me. It doesn't sit right for me that people who are suffering with conditions that can be managed, can be supported and in some cases are recoverable, do not get access to the help that they need.

It also bothers me that it's inequitable. So for example, people who can pay to see a psychologist, and that might be the right support that they need. Only people who can pay for those services get access to those services. That doesn't sit right for me that some people miss out purely because of their socioeconomic background. 

And I think it was this dissatisfaction that led me to, a tipping point and I was like, I need to do something. I need to get involved. Whether that's gaining knowledge or whether that's running myself, and I think that's what led me to apply for the program. I was like, could I make a meaningful difference this way?

I guess there were some personal reasons as well for this dissatisfaction. So when I was younger, like my late teens, early twenties, I had serious mental illness and I was hospitalized for mental illness at one stage. And I also missed out on the supports that I needed. And one of the reasons I missed out on supports was purely because I couldn't afford a car when I was younger. So I could afford a car outright, but there was no way that I could afford the maintenance, the license, the registration. And one of the programs that I really needed for my mental health recovery was an hour and a half away on public transport, and it ended late at night, which meant that I would be catching public transport home late at night. I didn't live in the safest suburb at the time, and so consequently I missed out.

I was able to do self-help books but it would've been much faster, much easier and better if I had access to the programs that were evidence-based and guided by people with expertise. And I guess I just don't want other people to be in that position. People shouldn't be missing out on healthcare is the main thing that I'm espousing here.

And I think that that's deeply political. I don't think we can separate the two. I'll be doing an episode coming up about whether psychology is political, mental health is political, but just spoiler, they are. They're intrinsically entwined. Because politics interacts who gets to access services and what kinds of services, people access. Politics can also take away services and they can give services. I think it's really important to have people with lived experience of mental illness, of disability, of chronic illness in politics because they understand it from firsthand experience. And I also think it's really important to have people with professional experience in politics, so people who are healthcare providers themselves, who are mental health workers, because we know what it's like on the ground.

So I guess that's a long-winded way of saying that I was deeply, personally invested in mental health. I wanted to see change in that, and I thought that the Pathways to Politics program could help me decide which level of politics would be best for me to enter and how I could create that change.

The application process itself, I just applied online. I made a video, uh, saying what my passion was. I did a stump speech is what it's called. So it's just a little speech, maybe two or three minutes, which is about your personal background, why you're passionate, what policies you would take to, I guess your constituents and what you wanted to see change, like specific stuff.

So I did a video, and then there was a selection process. So I was told that there was dozens of women who applied and in the end, 20 women were selected for the program, and I was lucky enough to be one of those women.

The program itself is a week long program, and that was in Western Australia. In other states, I've been told that they break it up into sessions. So you might do two days here and there, but it all adds up to the same amount of time that you spend in the program itself. What happens is that you get topics... so for example, the morning might focus on campaigning, and then you get real politicians come in to the program and speak to you about their backgrounds, about their challenges, about their opportunities, and it's really candid. So you need to agree to confidentiality essentially with the group. So what is said in the group by the politicians stays in the group. It's called Chatham House Rules. And I had to read about it and looking up, there's all this stuff that happens in politics, they just don't know.

Anyway, I loved hearing from the politicians themselves. So let me tell you about a few key highlights and standout moments for me. The first thing that I really enjoyed about the program was hearing from politicians of all different sides, and I loved that because as a psychologist, I love learning about my own biases, particularly the ones that I don't know about. And I noticed that I was biased against politicians from particular parties.` I just had really negative attitudes. But it's so interesting when you hear from politicians from those parties and then I get to understand their backgrounds, their passions, their values, and I really enjoyed getting a sense of the range of perspectives.

That was really important to me because it was emphasized in the program that, look, if you get into politics, you have to work with everyone. I mean, sometimes you don't, if you have a majority, but most of the time you do, you do need to talk to your colleagues from across the political divide. So it's really important to understand them. So I really appreciated that.

The second thing that I really enjoyed about the program itself was connecting with other participants. So I felt like so inadequate compared to the other participants. Here's little Bronwyn. I'm a psychologist. I've been working in the field for a few years. Yes, I have had heaps of volunteering experience and I've been quite prolific in mental health education before I became a psychologist, but I was still such a small fry.

Some of the other women in the program, they were already local counselors. They had already run for state elections. They were so inspiring. They were people out there in their communities doing really good stuff as well. They were a diverse group of women from different cultural linguistic backgrounds who had disability, chronic illness, and it was really cool just being in a room full of committed women.

I would say that, even though I felt inadequate, I felt like I belonged. And I think the key thing that brings this group together is that they believe change is possible, change is necessary, and that they have a role to play in creating that change, even if it is a small role. They don't believe in being apathetic or ignoring issues or turning a blind eye.

I really resonate with that, and I think that created that sense of belonging for me, because sometimes in groups you can feel like people ignore things. And I'm one of those people where if I see a person who is homeless on the street, it pains me, it, it hurts. And I'm like, why? Why is it like this? Why are there the have-nots and the haves? I really enjoyed connecting with other ladies in the program and I have made friends from people in the program.

Okay. A particular highlight for me, and I can say that they attended the program, I just can't say what they told us, but one of the people who came to speak to us was Politician Carmen Lawrence, and, carmen Lawrence is just, ah, she's just so inspiring. I hope one day I can get her on the podcast, If you don't know who Carmen Lawrence is, she was the first woman to become the premier of an Australian state when she'd led Western Australia from 1990 to 1993.

And one of the cool things about Carmen Lawrence is that she has a PhD in psychology. So she studied psychology and she was a researcher in psychology and fun fact, she was a lecturer in psychology and she was one of my lecturers when I did undergraduate studies in psychology way back when. And it was so cool to have a former premier as your lecturer in psychology.

So I think one of the things though... I guess getting serious about Carmen Lawrence, that I really respect is her tenacity, her clarity in the issues that she cares about. So, when Carmen came to speak to us, I really noticed those qualities in that the things that she says are all backed by evidence. She's very well read, very well considered, and I think she's able to present coherently both sides of an argument and then argue for her side, and it's very clear, why that side is beneficial, and I really love and respect that. I really love and respect coherent arguments that are clearly articulated. She achieved a lot of good change in her political career as a result of her deep commitment to her values and her commitment to getting things through for her constituents. I found just the realities of political life hearing from her and other politicians, just deeply inspiring and it made me think that, yeah, this is a viable pathway for creating change.

So what did I take away from the the biggest thing I learned from the program is just how politics works. I still didn't know much. My level of knowledge of politics comes back to year 11 when I was lucky enough to study politics in high school when I went to high school in Canberra. And we went and visited Parliament House in Canberra and that was really cool. And we went to question time and I think they invoked us. They were like, the school girls up here need better. And I was like, oh, they're referring to us. That's so cool. Um, so my knowledge of politics, yeah, is limited to high school.

So it was a real opportunity and I'm really grateful to have learned about some of the practicalities of politics. Like how do you get selected? How do you campaign? What's the difference between local, state, and federal government? What issues do they see differently? I really enjoyed that and I wish everybody could have access to this knowledge because it was such an engaging way of receiving it rather than reading through a website. I just wish there was a really cool, engaging program that just had cool videos and some cats and dogs in the videos just to make it more engaging, um, that so that we could all be on the same level of knowledge about how politics works.

Another takeaway from the program was some skills, I think primarily in networking. And the reason why I say that is because I have been scared of politicians, and that's because I've never had any interactions with them. So for me, I was like, oh, I couldn't possibly go speak to a politician. That's really scary. But the thing is, is that politicians work for us. They work for the people, and they should be open to listening to us and hearing from us. So I learned that it's okay to approach politicians, and in fact, it is necessary to do so if you have an issue that you are passionate about and you want to see change in that area.

The other insight that I took away was that it's really important to have representation in politics. We're not going to see change in the areas that affect, say, minorities, if we don't have minorities in politics. It's just that psychologically we have biases towards our own groups. It's an in-group bias. It's a known phenomenon. It's well studied. It's well replicated, and so we really need people outside of the. Majority groups in politics to be able to make a difference and to really get key legislation through that protects minorities and people who are vulnerable and make that change.

So what was the impact of the program on my future aspirations? Well, as a result of the program I had to think about what I wanted to do, and I took the ABC Electoral Compass quiz. It's a quiz that you can do where you see how your values stack up against what. Policies, the major political parties have. As a result of that, my politics were squarely in the middle of Labor and Greens, which annoyed me greatly. I was like, why can't I just be aligned with one or the other? That would be much easier.

So I had a choice to make. I was like, okay, who do I want to go with? When I read the policies and I thought about my own values, I decided to go towards the Greens. And so what I did was I joined The Greens as a member and I've been doing some volunteering with the Greens. I haven't put up my hand to run for the state or federal election. It would honestly have been too soon. They'd already selected the candidates, but also I think the capacity that I wanted to be involved in the future was supporting a campaign. Really what I want to be doing is if there is a Minister for Mental Health in the Greens or somebody similar, I wanna be talking with them about those policies and making sure that we put out really good policies.

So that's, that's my aspirations for the future. I would actually just like to support a campaign, maybe be involved as a staffer alongside politicians who are involved in mental health, disability, and just health in general. And I think that's, that's what I wanna do. I feel that I can make a change that way. Like I don't actually have to be the person running. I don't have to be the politician, but I can back people who have the values and the party values that that I very much respect.

Maybe in the future I will pursue a political role. I don't know. It's very uncertain, but I think what the program gave me was the confidence to be like, I could do that. I don't think it'd be easy, but I think there's a little sliver that it could be possible, and I think that's what the program wants to do, which is really important. And, and this is for somebody like me who has never had any contact with anybody in politics who is just a regular person and they've given me the thought that maybe I could do this. I think that's really amazing.

So if you've listened to what I've said and you're stuck through this whole episode and you thought it was interesting and you're a woman, maybe you wanna apply for the program. I would highly encourage you to do so or maybe have some further questions about it. If you want to apply for the program straight up, just head over to pathwaystopolitics.org.au.

If you have some questions or thoughts or you wanna ask me about stuff, please don't hesitate to email me. I would really love to hear from you. It's mentalworkpodcast@gmail.com. You can also DM me on Instagram or Facebook, and I'm really happy to have a chat with you about it.

Outside of politics, listeners, I would love to encourage you to step into leadership roles. For me, it's been a really important part of my identity that I've neglected in becoming a psychologist. I just feel like it was unacceptable to care about political issues, , and I felt like it was a part of my identity that I needed to keep secret and I think, in hindsight, it was damaging to me to keep it a secret, to keep secret, these things that I really care about.

And so I am really embracing that identity and I hope that if you care about political issues, if you care about health equity, if you care about people having access to the support that they need at the right time or any other issues that you care about step into some leadership roles that could look like committees, reference groups, sharing education. I encourage you to do that.

Thanks so much for listening to my thoughts and reflections on the Pathways to Politics program for women. I hope this was really interesting for you to just to hear about this program. If you've never heard of it before... bringing it to your attention. And I would like to thank the program for having me. It is such a privilege to be involved and I got so much out of it.

Okay, listeners, thank you so much for listening to the Mental Work Podcast. If you enjoyed today's episode, please do give the podcast a follow and make sure that you put the episode into somebody's ears who might be interested. It's the best way to get the podcast out there. I'm Bronwyn Milkins. Have a good one, and catch you next time. Bye.