Despite increased government spending, Australia lacks quality services to deal with the nation’s escalating suicide rate.

The Morrison government’s April budget responded to the nation’s rising suicide rate with an investment of $737 million into the mental health sector over seven years.

The Australian Bureau of Statistics recorded 3128 deaths by suicide in 2017, a nine per cent increase over the previous year.

Older people are more likely to take their own lives than young people and males commit suicide at more than three times the rate of females, the Bureau said.

Psychiatrist Ian Hickie, co-director of Sydney University’s Brain and Mind Centre, said the $737 million would fund “worthy” initiatives, but the Budget failed to address major structural challenges in mental health and suicide prevention.

Professor Hickie, a member of the National Mental Health Commission, said the government’s plan to roll out eight Headspace-style centres for adults would simply create another “access point” to a mental health system that lacks appropriate services.

“You can’t just have more and more open doors when there’s nothing behind the door,” he told The Sydney Morning Herald.

“What’s lacking are sophisticated services that are easily accessible and organised,” he said.

Commenting elsewhere, Prof Hickie said flaws in Australia’s mental health system included “poor access to quality services, the uneven roll-out of the National Disability Insurance Scheme, and the lack of accountability for reforming the system”.

“The next federal government faces major structural challenges in mental health and suicide prevention,” he said.

“Not surprisingly, this pre-election budget does not directly address these issues.”

He said the budget focuses on “less challenging but worthy” targets such as continued support for expansion of Headspace services for young people, additional support for early psychosis services, support for workplace-based mental health programs and support for new residential care centres for eating disorders.