Mike King calls for unity ahead of Gumboot Friday: 'Can't we just come together for our kids?'

As Aotearoa prepares for Gumboot Friday 2025, mental health advocate Mike King is calling on New Zealanders to come together and support a "greater cause": the mental well-being of our rangatahi.

Gumboot Friday, founded by Mike King, is a free counselling service for young people aged 25 and under.

"Dealing with depression and mental health challenges is like walking through mud every day," they said.

King hopes that on Friday, 1 November, New Zealanders from across the motu will show their support and 'gumboot up' for the day, reminding rangatahi that they can get through the mud.

"Wearing gumboots is a signal to young people who may be walking through life with depression - maybe walking through that mud - that there's someone who's thinking about me, there's someone who cares," King said.

Funding challenges

Gumboot Friday started in 2019, with around $13 million donated by the New Zealand public. Since then, it had provided more than 100,000 free counselling sessions to young people across the country, King said.

"It has a huge impact on the well-being of our rangatahi and our tamariki."

However, King said since Gumboot Friday received $24 million of government funding in 2024, many challenges had emerged.

"The government actually gave $24 million to the Ministry of Health, who retrospectively reimburses the fees we have already paid for counselling, capped at $500,000, but now everyone thinks we've got the full $24 million."

King said that many traditional avenues of support had closed because others believed they had "enough money".

"People need to understand that the government's funding is barely covering our standard service, and we still need to contribute as well.

"Every time we go over the $500,000 a month, we have to pay the extra."

King acknowledged that working in the mental health sector often invited backlash from the public, politicians, bureaucrats, and media.

"I think people are playing the man, and not the ball."

There was not a single charity in New Zealand that funded counselling sessions for youth at the scale Gumboot Friday did, King told RNZ.

Nor was there a charity which had given 100 percent of government funding towards its respective purpose.

"So, what do I say to people? OK, sure take the money off me then. What happens to all of those kids who need a service? Who could be on the verge of suicide? What happens to them?"

King said people's hatred or dislike of him as a figure did not concern him.

"It's got nothing to do with me, it's about the kids."

"As long as we're here doing stuff for the kids it doesn't matter what people say, it doesn't matter what people think. We just carry on and focus on what we do and keep doing it well."

A call for unity

King said there was a need for collective action in Aotearoa, and that societal issues like mental health should transcend personal grievances and political divides.

"Just about every avenue of welfare in this country, whether it's environment, whether it's housing, whether it's poverty, whether it's mental health, we are full of the little tribes who think they own those sectors.

"We're all busy attacking each other and we're forgetting the purpose."

At the end of their angry words and rhetoric were young people who are suffering, King said.

"We need to put our tribalism to one side and come together to support the greater cause, and it's just not happening."

King said that to tackle the issue of youth mental health in Aotearoa, people must stop judging others by their 'uniforms'.

"Whether someone is a 'Green' a 'Red', a 'Blue', Māori, Muslim or Christian... We're all judging by the uniforms. We're all sitting in our echo chambers and our tribes throwing rocks at each other and forgetting there is human beings under that uniform."

King said you may not agree with their political philosophy, but at the end of the day, "we all love our kids, so can't we just come together for our kids?"

Empowering the next generation

King said Aotearoa's youth should be empowered in all fields, including mental health.

"Back young kids and back their ideas. Give them the resources and give them the money to come up with the solutions to the problems that affect them.

"Get all the boomers out of it."

King said his generation did not fully understand young people today, because they did not have any reference to what they were going through.

"We need to give our kids permission to come up with solutions and the only way we can do that is to resource them... because if we're all wiped out tomorrow, they'll be just fine."

King said children were at the beginning of their marathon, and it was up to the country to ask, 'what do we want for them?'

"Do we want them living in sunshine and clear rain and great mental health, or do we want them being exactly like us, throwing stones at each other and living in fear?"

King said it was his generation's choice to make.

"Why? Because we have the resources that our kids need to get on and do what they need to do for their generation."

King said he hoped his generation could allow themselves to be vulnerable with rangatahi.

"If you tell [rangatahi] your hopes and fears, they will open up a world to you that you did not know existed."

"But that takes trust, and it takes a trade-off, and my generation are the ones that need to trade-off, and the problem with my generation is that we refuse to trade."

It was time to give rangatahi permission to lead the way, King said.

"They shouldn't have to wait till we die and get out of the way to make these decisions. Why? Because by the time that happens, they're boomers as well."

King's bike goes missing

Meanwhile, King said Sunday that the electric motorbike he has been touring the country on has been stolen, but it was later recovered.

King has been traveling New Zealand meeting communities and addressing youth climate anxiety since the first of October.

But he said he was shocked and disheartened to find that his bike was stolen at Baycourt community centre in downtown Tauranga today.

King said on social media he was offering a $500 reward for information about the bike.

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