Labor’s Royal Children’s Hospital cuts will hurt sick children

You are blessed if you are born healthy.

Not everyone has such good fortune.

Australia has an excellent health system which caters for, or should look after, those who happen to not be so lucky at birth.

Federally, in excess of $110 billion is spent nationally on health each year and the States, combined, contribute about another $80b.

They’re big numbers, but so worthwhile.

It is an investment in the greatest things this country has going for it … our people and their future.

When you have a healthy nation, you have a happy nation. And a productive nation.

This article centres around a country kid who was very much behind the door when luck was being handed out at birth and a bloody-minded, penny-pinching Federal Government which says health is at the heart of its policy platform and by its actions, is doing the complete opposite.

I entered politics to try to make a difference.

So when a young couple came to see me to outline the awful fate dealt to their baby daughter at her birth, I could not be anything but moved.

Anyone hearing their story would have surely been the same.

Their little girl was born without, in the parents’ words, “a bottom hole” – an anus.

In Australia, about one in 5,000 babies are born with an imperforate anus (also known as an anorectal malformation), which means they are born without a normal anal opening.

There are about 290,000 babies born in Australia annually, so the incidence of this abnormality is rare, yet concerning.

In the case of this girl, her condition has been a nightmare of extended hospital stays, operations, worry and different expert medical prognoses from around the world.

Finally, the parents met Professor Sebastian King of Melbourne.

In this field, Prof. King is world renowned. The best of the best.

“We knew he would be the one to perform the reconstruction surgery our daughter required to make her internal connections as normal as possible,” said the father.

“This involved among other things creating the missing openings including her bottom hole and urethra, diverting connections and closing stomas.

“Sebastian performed lead-up investigations and led a team of specialists for each system (bowel, urological and gynaecological).

“The surgery was 12 hours long and was a collaborative approach to gain the best outcome with the hope of limiting the amount of surgeries required in the future.

“Trusting someone with your child for 12 hours is indescribable.”

All the surgeries and procedures this beautiful little sandy-haired, blue-eyed girl has endured have, as her Dad says, “by no means have fixed everything”.

She requires a stringent diet and daily concoction of enemas and catheters, to manage her bowel and bladder as best as possible.

She has a daily battle to avoid infections.

Her loving parents, and the remarkable Prof. King, have given her the best chance possible.

At the time her parents first visited me, I sat beside the Health Minister Greg Hunt during Parliamentary Question Time.

We got to know each other very well.

Greg’s intellect was extraordinary but his care and compassion about his fellow human beings was next level.

My conversations with the Minister about my constituent family’s hardships and to see what we could do ultimately resulted, after extensive enquiries and planning, in a $5.9 million outlay to support, for five years, the Melbourne Paediatric Colorectal and Pelvic Reconstruction Centre at the Royal Children’s Hospital in April 2019.

This centre was created to look after children with imperforate anuses, Hirschsprung’s disease (a condition where the nerves in the bowel don’t form), and debilitating chronic constipation.

It was, I believe, one of the best expenditure items of Josh Frydenberg’s first Budget.

This small line item in the overall health spending (just remember that total yearly health cost of $110,000,000,000) was the right thing to do because it saved lives and immeasurably improved lives.

The Royal Children’s Hospital at the time was managing more than 300 patients with these conditions, with between 80 and 100 new patients each year.

Announcing the investment, Minister Hunt said: “We know these conditions are complex and that the majority of patients suffer from more than one condition. The new centre will provide on-the-ground benefits for children and their families suffering from these conditions.

“The centre will improve referral pathways and strengthen collaboration between specialists. This will ensure that children receive high quality, co-ordinated care without unnecessary tests and procedures.”

In subsequent years, Prof. King has sent nurses to America to receive specialised training.

It is no exaggeration to say the centre was starting to perform little miracles and the future looked so encouraging.

I knew my insistence on getting such a facility funded was one of the best things I could have done as Deputy Prime Minister, when a footballer – in his late 50s – phoned me, out of the blue, one day to tell me his story.

“This won’t benefit me,” he started, “but it will certainly help others to avoid the shame and embarrassment I’ve lived with all my life so more strength to your arm.”

He explained he had played in a suburban competition but all his footy career he had to go to games dressed and could not undress in front of his team-mates or shower after a game for fear they would find out he had to wear a nappy.

“Can you just imagine how that has been for me over all of these years?” he said, choking up.

A few tears were shed during the rest of the call, from both ends of the line, as I contemplated just what this poor fellow had been forced to tolerate all of his life.

Sadly, inexplicably, the Federal Labor Government will not continue to support this vital centre.

Patients, often newborns, will instead be placed in beds in general wards, already under pressure in a busy and strained hospital system and without the specialised care and support they so desperately need and deserve.

I’ve tried, without success, to get the Government to reverse the decision, even taking it as high as the Prime Minister.

For the life of me, I cannot fathom why this has happened.

It has left world-leading specialists without a future for their work, affected families distraught and deprived babies and youngsters of future hope.

This week is Federal Budget week.

Let’s hope common sense and a modicum of compassion can prevail.

First published in the Herald-Sun, 27 March 2025.

An edited extract of the full OpEd which appears here.

Emma Sullivan