Blog by Neil FrancisPosted on Sunday 24th May 2026 at 5:01am
Source: "Online Marketing" at Unsplash
A new public hospital is opening in south-west Brisbane this week, yet it promises to prohibit provision of lawful contraception, abortion and VAD services. The public's values and preferences are being trampled on their own taxpayer dime.
A new public hospital, the Mater in Springfield, south-west greater Brisbane, is opening this week. Even before the ceremonial tape is cut, it has promised to prohibit provision of lawful contraception, abortion and voluntary assisted dying (VAD) services. How can this be?
How is the hospital constituted?
Mater Hospital Springfield is a public-private partnership between the Queensland state government and Mater Misericordiae Limited (as "Mercy Partners"), a Catholic church "Public Juridic Person". That is, the operator is under the "canonical sponsorship and civil ownership of Mercy Partners", according to its own leadership and governance page.
In plain language, that means it operates according to Catholic church "rules". And the Catholic church is opposed to contraception, abortion and VAD (amongst other things).
Who's paying?
According to public documents, Mater stumped up a $26m parcel of land as the site for the construction of the new hospital facilities. The state government contributed $393m in capital construction, and a further $638m over four years for operational costs.
That is, Mater provided just 6.2% ($26m/$419m) of the total capital cost, and the government the rest. In total costs for capital and the first four years of operations, Mater is providing less than 2.5% ($26m of $1057m total).
Put the other way around, more than 97.5% of total costs over four years are being funded from public taxpayer pockets. Note too that Mater's contribution is a capital amount (land) that is not consumed and is certain to appreciate in value. No risk there.
What do the catchment area public think about VAD?
The Catholic church firmly believes VAD is wrong. For its own devotional values, identity and practices, that's fine. But a public hospital is not a Catholic cathedral.
So what do the public think about VAD? Here, we can be quite specific, because we know the attitudes of people who live in the catchment area of the hospital. It's located in the Queensland electoral District of Jordan, and is intended to service a public radius of about 15km. So that also includes the Districts of Algester, Bundamba, Inala and Logan.
At the 2019 federal election, VoxPop, better known as VoteCompass, asked voters for their views about the statement "Terminally ill patients should be able to end their own lives with medical assistance." Across Australia, more than half a million voters answered. That included thousands across the hospital catchment area, and here's what they said (Table 1).
Table 1: Mater Hospital catchment area public attitudes toward VAD
District
N
Strongly disagree
Disagree
Neutral
Don't Know
Agree
Strongly agree
Total disagree
Total agree
Jordan
867
5%
4%
8%
4%
20%
59%
9%
79%
Algester
692
6%
4%
9%
4%
19%
58%
11%
77%
Bundamba
805
5%
4%
8%
3%
21%
58%
9%
79%
Inala
815
5%
4%
9%
4%
20%
57%
10%
77%
Logan
650
5%
4%
8%
4%
22%
57%
9%
79%
Amongst the public in the hospital's catchment area, more than three-quarters (77%-79%) approve of VAD. Only a tiny minority (5%-6%), like the Catholic church, strongly disapprove. And a clear majority (57%-59%) in every District strongly approve. So far, so clear.
What do catchment area Catholics think about VAD?
Mater being a Catholic-operated public hospital, might lead us to wonder what Catholics in the catchment area think of VAD. We know that, too (Table 2), also from the VoteCompass study.
Table 2: Mater Hospital catchment area Catholic attitudes toward VAD
District
Disagree
Neutral
Agree
Jordan
12%
10%
78%
Algester
14%
12%
74%
Bundamba
11%
10%
79%
Inala
14%
11%
74%
Logan
14%
11%
75%
Amongst Catholics in the hospital's catchment area, around three-quarters or more (74%-79%) approve of VAD. Again, only a tiny minority (11%-14%) disapprove.
In plain speak, most catchment area Catholics (and in fact Catholics Australia-wide) profoundly disagree with the church's stance on VAD.
The tyranny
But the hospital isn't servicing just Catholics (who don't agree with its VAD stance anyhow). It's servicing the public. How is it that the public pays for a public service, but is selectively denied some of those services because public representatives (the government) hand ultimate control to a tiny group that disapprove of the public's values and beliefs?
Is the hospital being run for the benefit of the Australian public as they see fit regarding relevant lawful services, or for the Vatican's pleasure?
A word of clarification: this column does not argue against personal conscientious objection. That is a highly important principle ensuring that each human person can participate, or not, in what they believe to be moral, or not. Rather, this column is about institutional rules that suppress the expression of conscience of everyone of a different view, including people working within the institution.
Why should Australians, most of whom are not Catholic (and most Catholics disagreeing with the church's stance) pay to be oppressed by institutional prohibition of lawful healthcare services?
It is well established that institutional prohibition is a significant barrier to accessing services. Why do governments actively choose to put these barriers in place?
What's the standard?
Take an imaginary comparison: the government awards an electricity distribution contract to a religious organisation. That organisation opposes use of powered devices on the Sabbath, so there is no electrical supply on that day in the supplier's catchment area. Sure, the public can try and source electricity elsewhere — say, by buying a generator from Bunnings, however far away that is — merely to satisfy the minority view of the religious supplier. And there are even likely to be employees at the supplier who conscientiously object to its policy, but self-censor to keep their jobs. Downside effects are not limited to customers.
Crazy stuff, and you'd argue that would never happen. But it does in healthcare, a highly regulated professional service you can't just pick up with your groceries.
Until voters front up to their governments and demand that public service providers offer lawful and relevant public services, governments will continue to enter into cosy arrangements with minority groups that wish to prevent others from accessing what those others pay for, and believe to be both moral and relevant to their current situation.
