HEAL: A Global Day for Truth, Power and Collective Healing

Kathie Melocco
May 10
3 min read

Why GIDII Advocacy Is Standing With Others This June 1

Across the country, people are rising. Unions, advocates, families, and injured workers are speaking out against recent moves by the NSW Government to raise the impairment threshold for psychological injury claims, a change that risks pushing even more people out of care, out of work, and out of hope.

We at GIDII Advocacy are just one of many standing up. Prior to these developments we had planned to host HEAL in person but after consultation with many others have made the decision this should be an online event instead to allow for as manay as possible people to attend. So...

This Injured Workers Day, June 1, we’re hosting HEAL, a global online gathering. Not to claim the spotlight, but to add our voice and the voices of others that need to be heard. To join others in saying: enough is enough.

Why HEAL, and Why Now?

We believe systems should be held to account, and insurers, in particular, must not be allowed to continue practices that retraumatize people already harmed.

But we also believe something just as important:

People have a right to heal.

At GIDII, we work alongside individuals and communities who’ve experienced deep harm inside workers’ compensation systems, to bring about change with the regulators, the insurers, the decision makes. What we hear again and again is that it’s not just the injury, it’s the way people are treated afterwards that leaves lasting scars.

That’s why we created HEAL:Hope. Empowerment. Accountability. Liberation.

It’s a space for the many, not the few.A time to reflect, bear witness, and imagine what justice might look like if people came first.

June 1: A Day With Deep Roots

Injured Workers Day began in Canada more than 40 years ago. Since then, it’s become a global day of action, recognised by unions, survivor-led groups, and advocates across many countries.

In Australia, momentum has grown in recent years, especially in response to rising psychological injuries and the failure of systems to respond with care and respect.

This year, those failures feel especially sharp.

Proposed changes in NSW would raise the bar for psychological injury support so high that many may never reach it, especially those experiencing early trauma, suicidal thoughts, or cumulative harm. The danger is real. The silence is dangerous. That’s why this June 1 matters more than ever.

What You’ll Experience on the Day

🗓 Sunday, June 1, 2025🕙 10:00am – 3:00pm AEST💻 Live on Substack – Free to attend📩 Subscribe here to receive the full program and link

We’re creating a digital space where lived experience, truth-telling, grief, and vision can come together. You’ll hear from people with diverse perspectives, not as victims, but as advocates, leaders, and catalysts for change.

Confirmed speakers include:

Dean Yates, author of Line in the Sand, on media, trauma and the power of moral clarity
Sarah & Georgina Ubrien, family is everything, on grief, loss and long roads to justice
Ballina Gee, GIDII Co-Founder, on safeguarding and the myth of 'resilience' in broken systems
Kathie Melocco, GIDII Co-Founder, communications professional, chaplain and producer of Shattered on healing Moral Injury
Rosemary Ferguson McKenzie, cultural leader, holding space for intergenerational healing
Vasalia Govender, advocate for Injured Workers, on institutional betrayal across continents

More names will be announced in coming days, including community advocates, young people, and international allies.

A Collective Ceremony of Healing

We’ll close the day with a global healing ceremony a chance to honour:

Those we've lost to suicide and despair
Those still entangled in harmful systems
Those who continue to resist, recover and rise

Light a candle. Write a name. Be present with us.

This moment belongs to all of us, and to those no longer here to tell their story.

Not About Us — About All of Us

GIDII Advocacy is one part of a growing movement. We don’t speak for everyone, and we don’t seek to. We’ve simply created this space for those who need it, and we welcome all who want to be part of a better way forward.

We honour the work of unions, legal advocates, survivor-led groups, mental health professionals, journalists, and whistleblowers, many of whom have paved the road we walk now.

We believe healing must be part of the resistance.We believe grieving can be a form of power. And we believe the system can’t change until the truth is told, by many, together.