Thank you, Deputy.
I guess it's not a surprise, particularly for this table, that the “Strong, Secure, Engaged” focus on people from the Prime Minister and the minister is animating, informing, and shaping our approach.
The deputy referred to “the journey”. That's a broader expression of those transition points that the deputy spoke to in the context of someone who is moving toward retirement. Think about postings. Think about someone who is ill but they're going to return to work, because that's the objective. You talk about the career courses, and all those areas have policy points, so investment of a policy division and increasing the capability there, understanding that we have about 37 primary care clinics across the CAF, 31 of which have dedicated mental health practitioners.
As we move the ill and injured, we recognize they need to have dedicated and specific focused care. That's the establishment of joint personnel support units, that concept of providing dedicated oversight with a proper career case management number so you can get personalized care, awareness of individuals, and the specifics of the files. It's recognizing the $198 million over the course of the government's investment in total health and wellness.
When we think of this as long-standing tracking or suicide prevention, and understanding the factors and the causalities that lead to people making desperate choices at times, we have for many years now been tracking suicide rates and understanding and featuring that in our approach to mental health.
Of course, we have also seen an increase in the number of mental health positions, approximately 455 across those 37 clinics, within 31 that have dedicated mental health professionals.
It's also important that in our civilian system 4,000 mental health care providers have registered to provide care to military members in their own practices. That's a great enabler for an individual to get timely access and a variety of access, because sometimes geography doesn't naturally lend itself or make it easy for a person to access care, because of a posting to a recruiting centre in a town that's not immediately proximate to a major base, as an example.