From July 2027, a new health service provider will take statewide responsibility for maternity, neonatal, and child health in WA. The Child and Adolescent Health Service will merge with King Edward Memorial Hospital, and the new Women and Babies Hospital will be under one organisation, a change the Cook Government says follows clinical consultation carried out in 2023 and 2025.
At Perth Children’s Hospital, an additional $95.4 million will fund 19 new neonatal beds, along with two new rooms for mothers who need hospital care themselves while their baby is at PCH for specialist treatment.
A dedicated Newborn Emergency Transfer Service hub will be set up at the new Women and Babies Hospital in Murdoch, with a smaller expansion of the existing NETS service at PCH. NETS runs a mobile intensive care unit that moves about 1,100 sick newborns and young infants each year from the hospital where they were born to another one for urgent care. Paediatric services at Fiona Stanley Hospital will also expand, with more paediatric specialists available to residents in Perth’s south and east.
“Following consultations with clinicians and Western Australian families, we’ve identified a need to align our State-wide maternity, neonatal and paediatric services under one umbrella,” said Health Minister Meredith Hammat.
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“A new dedicated health service provider will provide enhanced coordination and oversight, and support continuity of care for families from pregnancy, to birth and the childhood years.”
What doctors are still objecting to
The new Women and Babies Hospital is being built next to Fiona Stanley Hospital in Murdoch, about 20 kilometres from PCH, where some newborns will need to be transferred for specialist surgery and care. Doctors, families, and the Opposition have argued since 2023 that it should go on the QEII campus in Nedlands instead, alongside PCH and Sir Charles Gairdner. The Government says building there would either disrupt the hospitals already on site or delay the project unacceptably.
Australian Medical Association WA president Kyle Hoath told the ABC the upgrades were welcome but didn’t resolve the problem, with services that need to sit side by side still separated. The AMA estimates that between 100 and 200 babies a year would need to be moved between the two hospitals. The Government’s own response to the consultation report says there is no consensus on how large that group would be. Opposition health spokesperson Libby Mettam described the plans as flawed. Merging the services under one provider changes how they are run, not where they are.
That consultation report, dated November 2025, was only tabled in parliament this week. It records that clinicians considered and rejected a smaller satellite birthing facility at PCH on safety, workforce, and service fragmentation grounds. The PCH upgrades will also require moving admin staff out of the building and relocating a surgical ward.
