Hon Matt Doocey
Minister for Mental Health

Mental Health Minister Matt Doocey says that the government’s work to strengthen New Zealand’s mental health and addiction workforce continues to build momentum, announcing today that the Auckland University of Technology (AUT) is joining the work to develop the training for the new associate psychologist role.

“Demand for mental health and addiction services continues to grow. Unfortunately, despite this demand, we have many psychology students graduating each year with undergraduate degrees that are unable to progress to work in mental health, due to limited intake into training programmes that lead to registered psychology roles,” says Mr Doocey.

“I’m delighted that AUT will be helping to develop training for a role that will offer many more psychology students the opportunity to go on to build careers in mental health and support more people to receive timely support.

“I’m committed to growing our mental health and addiction workforce so more New Zealanders receive the support they need, when they need it. This Government is doing that by investing in a range of initiatives that will enable us to continue to build our workforce, expand capacity, and ensure we have a training pipeline.

“Since announcing the role, there has been some misconceptions and concerns that are necessary to clear up.

“Psychologists will continue to play a vital part in this workforce. We have been hard at work to support universities to grow psychologist numbers by investing to increase the number of new psychology internships from 40 to 80 per year by 2027.

“The creation of the new associate psychologist role is designed to support, not replace the existing psychology workforce. They will work under supervision of a psychologist, within mental health or addiction services.

“Working with aspects of care that have been defined as less complex within a multi-disciplinary team, this will allow existing registered psychologists to focus on the more complex work they’re trained for.

“Undergraduate students who have already completed a major in psychology may be eligible to go on to complete a one-year postgraduate diploma to become a qualified associate psychologist. This offers psychology students a new pathway option that will see more people gaining the qualifications they need to and retain more people in the mental health and addiction workforce.”

Last month Minister Doocey announced that the University of Canterbury were the first to be selected to develop the Government’s new associate psychologist training programme. 

“Together, the two universities are working to prepare a curriculum to train the first intake of students in 2026. It will be exciting to see the first graduates joining the workforce in 2027,” Mr Doocey says.

“Last year I announced New Zealand’s first targets for mental health and addiction, including the target to train 500 new mental health and addiction health professionals every year. The mental health and addiction workforce plan aims to deliver on that target through a broad range of initiatives, including better utilisation of the Peer Support workforce and increasing the number of psychology internships. The creation of innovative new roles such as associate psychologists is another way we are strengthening the mental health and addiction support available.”

Note:

• AUT will be working alongside the University of Canterbury to develop the training programme for the qualification, with guidance from Health New Zealand | Te Whatu Ora and the New Zealand Psychologists Board (NZPB) who are developing the scope of practice, competencies and accreditation process for the role.
• NZPB will also advise on a final title for the role, so the name “associate psychologist” is being used as a placeholder.

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