Ms Louise Southalan

Director
Mental Health Matters 2 Ltd
Australia

Louise Southalan is a lawyer with a background in health and justice policy, and in research. She is a board member of Mental Health Matters 2 Ltd, a lived experience led charity working to embed Lived Experience expertise and the Lived Experience (Peer) workforce at all levels of the justice, mental health and alcohol and other drugs systems and services. She is employed by Wungening Aboriginal Corporation in their research and evaluation team, and at Curtin University as a research associate in the Justice Health Group. Her work with Wungening is focused on ensuring that research which Wungening leads or partners in is carried in out ways which put the voices and perspectives of Aboriginal people at the centre and value Aboriginal expertise and experience. At Curtin her roles have included establishing the Justice Health Group’s Community and Lived Experience Advisory Group, as well as supporting a range of research projects. Louise has Masters degrees in International and Community Development and in Mental Health Policy and Services. She is a graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors and completed a Churchill Fellowship examining national initiatives to support state-based prison mental health services. Louise is a steering committee member of the Worldwide Prison Health Research and Engagement Network and a Technical Adviser to the WHO Health in Prisons Program. She has worked in senior roles within the WA Mental Health Commission and the WA Department of Justice on policy and service reforms in the justice/mental health/AOD systems.