A youth mental health facility closed down. Eight months later, 3 teenagers were dead.

A mental health facility for young people closed down. Now three teenagers are needlessly dead – and an inquiry is set to find out why.

Before it closed, the Barrett Adolescent Psychiatric Centre was Queensland’s only long-term, live-in mental health facility for young people at risk of suicide.

When the state government closed it down in January last year, the families of high-risk teenagers worried about what would happen to vulnerable local kids.

The LNP government said those high-risk kids would be looked after, with Queensland Health saying community care closer to home was more appropriate, and that replacement services including two beds at the Mater Hospital were available.

But despite those reassurances, three young people took their lives within just months of the centre’s closing — and now an inquiry is poised to find out why.

ABC’s 7:30 Queensland program reports that the suicide deaths of local teenagers Caitlin Wilkinson Whiticker, Talieha Nebauer and Will Fowell all came within eight months of the  government’s decision to close the centre, which functioned as an independent section of the larger mental health facility The Park.

Related: The Queensland mental health service is broken: Petition.

Now, an inquiry is set to ask why the closure happened at all. The commission inquiry — which was allocated $9.5 million in Tuesday’s state budget — was an election promise made by Labor soon after 7.30 revealed government documents warned of potential deaths if the centre was closed.

Announcing the inquiry, Queensland Health Minister Cameron Dick said it would focus on the “full facts surrounding the decisions” and the “subsequent tragic deaths” of the three teens.

“The Government is committed to seeking out the truth because the families, staff, community and families of others impacted by the centre’s closure, at the very least deserve to know what happened,” he said.

Related: There’s been an increase in the number of teenage girls self-harming.

Nebauer’s mother Nichole Pryde told 7:30 she has been desperate for an inquiry since the death of her 17-year-old daughter in April 2014, just nine weeks after the girl was moved into an adult facility.

Talieha tried to take her own life on 1 April 2014, before her life support was shut down five days later, according to the Brisbane Times.

“You go to bed of a night time and you don’t want to fall asleep because you don’t know how your child is going to be, you’re just always on edge waiting for the next thing to happen,” Ms Pryde told the ABC in an emotional interview.

“I fought hard to get her to go (the Barrett Centre) because I thought that was the last chance of keeping her alive,” she said. “I just want justice for Talieha.”

The devastated mother added that the clinic director had told her at the time her daughter moved into an adult unit that it was the best “out of a list bad options” for the girl.

“She expressed concerns that there were plenty of places where she could … harm herself,” Ms Pryde said.

Talieha’s aunt, Melinda, last year told the Brisbane Times her niece had struggled with the transition from full-time care at the Barrett Centre to an adult unit.

“So she went from the Barrett Centre – which is like a hospital with 24-hour care with nurses on staff – to independent living,” she said.

“She was living by herself in a little unit within the Pine Rivers Community Care centre.”

“So she spent three years in a hospital-type accommodation – I mean she was still a teenager at heart – she hadn’t learnt all the everyday things you need to live by yourself.”

Last year, the parents of Fowell, 18, and Wilkinson Whiticker, 18, also told 7:30 Queensland they supported the establishment of an inquiry — and believed the Barrett Centre was closed without a proper transition process.

Ms Wilkinson-Whiticker’s mother said her daughter started contemplating suicide at age of 13 and tried several times, as had all the kids at the facility.

“If they really had to close the Barrett Centre, if they really approached that in a honest and transparent way and a morally justified way, then perhaps these deaths may not have needed to occur,” Ms Wilkinson told 7:30 last year.

Queensland’s deputy coroner announced an inquest into the teens’ deaths in December, and the newly announced commission of inquiry will share in that task, ABC News reports.

Opposition Leader Lawrence Springborg, who was the health minister responsible for closing the facility, will face the witness box during the inquiry.

The government is yet to announce dates for either inquiry.

If you need help, call Lifeline on 13 11 14 or Kids Helpline on 1800 551 800.

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