The federal government will spend $10 million upgrading the birthing, maternity and neonatal intensive care unit at Royal Darwin Hospital, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese announced during a Northern Territory tour this week. The work includes 16 birthing suites and is due for completion in late 2027.
The money follows the closure last year of Darwin's private maternity service, run by Healthscope, which pushed about 250 additional births a year onto the public hospital. Health Minister Mark Butler, Indigenous Australians Minister Malarndirri McCarthy and the local member for Solomon, Luke Gosling, joined the announcement on Monday.
“Having a baby should be a joyful time, and families deserve high-quality care, no matter where they live," Albanese said. McCarthy said all mothers deserved "safe, affordable and accessible maternity care." Gosling was more pointed about what the funding did and did not do: "This investment strengthens public maternity care, but it does not replace the private maternity service Darwin lost.”
The upgrade was one of several announcements on a tour that began on Saturday with Albanese's first visit as prime minister to the Tiwi Islands, where he was pressed on skipping this year's Garma Festival and on a bid for a Northern Territory AFL licence.
At a Darwin press conference on Tuesday, Albanese repeated his government's commitment to return the Port of Darwin to Australian ownership, saying he was "determined that it will come back into Australian hands." The port was leased to the Chinese-owned Landbridge Group for 99 years in 2015, in a $506 million deal struck by the Northern Territory government that later drew national security objections in Canberra. The government has not set a date for completing the buyback.
The maternity upgrade is due for completion in late 2027. Until then, Royal Darwin Hospital carries the additional births.
