Australia’s second-largest hospital operator will be propped up by two major banks as it struggles with crippling debt.
Commonwealth Bank announced on Monday it would provide $100 million to support Healthscope, which operates 37 hospitals in every Australian state and territory.
Westpac has agreed to continue to provide assistance to help receivers sell the business, offering some clarity to the provider’s 18,000 employees.
Receivers have been appointed, led by McGrathNicol partner Keith Crawford, who said the focus was to engage “constructively with all key stakeholders to ensure uninterrupted operation of Healthscope hospitals”.
Crawford said the intention was to transition all hospitals to new ownership. There are no plans for closures or redundancies.
Healthscope said while the parent entity had gone into receivership, the operational business, which runs the hospitals, has not.
Every hospital would operate as normal, chief executive Tino La Spina said.
He revealed the additional funding would ensure a stable path to sale.
“There is no interruption to the outstanding care we provide … the additional funding, while we do not anticipate it being required, provides additional support,” La Spina said.
“The receivers and management share the same goal of maintaining our market-leading standards of patient care and protecting the business, the hospitals and our amazing people.”
Federal Health Minister Mark Butler said the focus was on patients and Healthscope’s 19,000 staff.
“I expect to see an orderly sale process eventuate from this decision to any owner with no impact on patients and hard-working staff. My department has recently met with the receivers and me to make that exact same point to them,” he said.
Butler said one in every seven or eight private hospital procedures in Australia was in a Healthscope hospital – meaning its collapse would put further strain on public resources.
“That is why we have been so determined – and I know my state and territory colleagues share the view – to make sure if there is a sale of Healthscope hospitals, which is now clear there will be, it is undertaken in an orderly, stable way that protects the operations of those hospitals,” he said.
But he said there would be no taxpayer-funded bailout of Healthscope’s owner, Canadian asset management giant Brookfield.
“I think over time there will no doubt be reflection around the wisdom of such important assets held in the hands of overseas private equity firms,” Butler said.
The Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation earlier said it had been working with members and stakeholders navigating the financial difficulties and uncertainty.
“For the nurses and midwives who care for patients in Healthscope every day, this is a very difficult and worrying time,” union official Phoebe Mansell said.
“The financial collapse of Healthscope is a stark and shocking reminder of the dangers of privatising essential healthcare services.”
The operator owns Sydney’s Northern Beaches Hospital, Hobart Private Hospital, Darwin Private Hospital and Melbourne’s Knox Private Hospital.
Independent Tasmanian MP Andrew Wilkie said any loss of hospital beds in Hobart would put the entire state’s health system at risk.
“It shouldn’t have come to this,” he said.
“This is as much an issue for the Tasmanian government as it is for Healthscope.”
In May 2024, then chief executive Greg Horan said even though the sector was “facing considerable headwinds”, providing the “best care” remained a top priority.
Healthscape came under scrutiny following the death of two-year-old Joe Massa at the Northern Beaches Hospital in September 2024.
The toddler died after being wrongly triaged and waiting two hours for a hospital bed. He was later transferred to Sydney Children’s Hospital in Randwick following a cardiac arrest but succumbed to brain damage.
Healthscope moved to shut down maternity services in Darwin and Hobart earlier in 2025.
-with AAP
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