There is something uniquely insane about the Labor Party spending the best part of 2025 demonising social media, the internet, and mobile phones as a mental health catastrophe for young people – only to turn around in 2026 and launch their ‘free therapy’ on smart devices.

In one of the smarmiest videos possible – published on social media, of course – the Prime Minister tried to sell the government’s ‘free’ mental health check as if that’s top of mind while people are queuing at empty servos.

You can now get free therapy from home with our new Medicare Mental Health Check In.

No cost. No referral. All covered by Medicare. pic.twitter.com/3etqkZkEo1

— Anthony Albanese (@AlboMP) April 3, 2026

The Prime Minister’s delivery is so bad it almost makes me long for the election campaign when he brandished his Medicare card like some sort of shield against criticism.

Those commenting beneath the ratioed post were quick to point out that there was nothing free about a Medicare mental health check.

The Medicare Levy is not free. It is a tax.

I was personally so traumatised by the Prime Minister’s social media announcement that I decided to ‘have a go’ at their ‘free’ mental health check. Apparently, you don’t need an appointment or a diagnosis. Just a lingering sense of dread brought about by the rapid decline of the nation.

My choices are:

• Managing worries
• Improving your mood
• Sleeping better
• Reframing unhelpful thoughts
• Facing your fears
• Solving problems more effectively

I consider the Prime Minister to be ‘a worry’ that needs to be ‘managed’ which leads to ‘unhelpful thoughts’. It’s a blurred line, but we’ll go with option one.

This sent me to a dead end of waffle telling me that ‘feeling anxious is normal’, that I am ‘not alone’, and I need to ‘understand what’s going on with my worry’.

From there I was directed to a six-week interactive over-the-phone session with ‘practical activities’ that I can ‘build into my everyday life’.

Which sounds like torture.

Am I ready to call the 1800 number and sit on hold with a call centre? Sounds relaxing and not at all like PTSD from over a decade trying to get through to Optus and Telstra.

The ‘reframing unhelpful thoughts’ option might be better…

Thoughts are like stories we tell ourselves, and they can lift us up or weigh us down.

Sometimes, your thoughts can feel strong and upsetting, especially when you’re feeling stressed, worried, flat, or going through a tough time.

Your thoughts don’t just influence your emotions; they affect how you feel physically and how you act. These changes can have a big impact on your wellbeing.

And then there’s this gem.

It can be useful to look at your thoughts with curiosity to see if any common thinking patterns might be making things harder for you in the moment.

Is this what therapy is meant to be like?

Perhaps I am not the target audience for this freebie.

I have always found solving the root cause a much better solution than sitting around chatting about my feelings.

The point is, the country is in the middle of a self-inflicted political catastrophe that is producing very real economic, social, cultural, and domestic problems as people struggle to keep a roof over their head.

It is easy to understand why mental health is declining.

However, just like sending therapists to soothe farmers in the middle of the drought after they had to shoot their stock served as a poor substitute for shipping feed and water, so too is trying to patch-up the mental health of a nation when the problem is structural.

People aren’t angry at the Prime Minister because his government launched a mental health app, they are furious at what feels like dithering when it should be all hands on deck.

What do you think? You can try it out here…