About
CAN (Mental Health) Inc
CAN (Mental Health) Inc. is short for Consumer Activity Network (Mental Health) Inc. We officially incorporated on 4th November 2005 and are growing each and every year.
Our Mission:
"Actively together for better mental health".
Our Purpose:
"A grass roots organisation that promotes, supports and enhances mental health, wellbeing and recovery journeys".
Our Vision:
" We CAN. We CARE. The Future is in Our Hands".
Ms Julie McCrossin, well known Australian media broadcaster and journalist is our Patron . If you are interested in becoming a CAN Ambassador please don't hesitate to contact us to discuss further. We would love to hear from you and raise the profile of CAN the very length and breadth of our vast country we call come - Australia.
Our Living History:
Prior to 2005 CAN (Mental Health) were a former sector consumer network (Northern Beaches Mental Health Consumer Network) for 11.5 years - as one of the very first established (1994) and oldest networks in Australia at the time - the Northern Sydney Mental Health Consumer Network, under the Northern Sydney Central Coast Mental Health Services.
When the health service disbanded the Northern Sydney Mental Health Consumer Network in 2005 and wanted to bring each sector network under their relevant mental health service, the consumers on the Northern Beaches said "no way, hosea - we want to retain our independence" therefore we incorporated in our own right and registered our network as the Consumer Activity Network (Mental Health) Inc.
As part of our incorporation we brought "Pitane Recovery Centre" (which we established in August 2003 on the grounds of a local hospital) under the CAN (Mental Health) Inc. banner. (Please refer to our Pitane page for more history and current activities.)
For the first year of our incorporation we had no office, very little funding (having to fundraise each month the monies to pay the insurance) and all our possessions were housed in the inaugual board members homes. Pitane Recovery Centre activities were fully relocated to be held at local community venues - hence the name "Mobile Pitane" which we still undertake to this day.
These days
CAN (Mental Health) Inc. now has a national board of management. We are funded to provide the "Community Connections" peer support services from the Department of Health & Ageing, Suicide Prevention Branch (since January 2007) - one of the very first independent consumer organisations to be funded to provide peer support services in Australia.
Our head office is located at 6A/15 Orchard Rd, Brookvale and we have a Hospital to Home service office co-located at Flowerdale Cottage at Liverpool. (Please refer to the Community Connections page for more information about our peer support services.)
Consumers, interested individuals and interested organisations are able to become Members of our organisation. (Please refer to our Members page for more details.)
CAN (Mental Health) Inc. also hosts the NSW Mental Health Consumer of the Year Awards to highlight and celebrate the achievements of mental health consumers in NSW. These are the only consumer run Awards in Australia - run by consumers for consumers. We believe many consumers are doing lots of wonderful activities and promoting people's recovery journeys and are the unsung hereos of the Australian Mental Health Consumer Movement, therefore we need to celebrate and acknowledge the contributions of the unsung hereos making the lives of mental health consumers all that much more for the better.
