Severe Tropical Cyclone Fina damage exposes need for new Royal Darwin Hospital

Last weekend, as Severe Tropical Cyclone Fina rumbled past Darwin as a category three system, the Northern Territory's biggest hospital suffered significant damage.

Part of an external wall collapsed, dropping dozens of bricks outwards, through the roof of a lower level of the hospital and into an internal passageway frequented by both staff and patients, just metres from a vending machine.

As NT Health Minister Steve Edgington remarked in parliament this week: "It's incredible, Madam Speaker, the area is a well-travelled area at the hospital, but nobody was injured".

But what happens when the next decently-sized cyclone hits the Top End?

Royal Darwin Hospital (RDH) was built in the aftermath of Cyclone Tracy, which devastated Darwin in 1974, and it's becoming clear the ageing facility is now approaching its 50-year life-span.

As NT Health chief executive Chris Hosking put it this week: "The old hospital's just about had its day".

NT calls for federal support

Mr Edgington strongly agreed, and said RDH was "getting beyond its useful life".

In a statement to the ABC on Wednesday, the NT's Department of Logistics and Infrastructure said "further safety checks and inspections were undertaken" after the brick facade's collapse, which "found another section of wall that requires further investigation".

Engineers are assessing the entire building amid concerns for another section of the wall, and Mr Edgington said he was not aware of any structural issues at RDH prior to the cyclone.

But he's putting the onus on the Commonwealth to stump up and fund the facility's replacement, claiming the NT is being "short-changed $400 million" on health funding.

"What we are asking is for the federal government to think about what's needed here in the Northern Territory when it comes to health.

"We have some of the worst cases of disease here in the Northern Territory."

He's right — the NT has some of the worst health outcomes in Australia, and its health system is consistently stretched to breaking point.

An ageing RDH also doesn't help the morale of workers inside the building — decades-old facilities, in an architectural design suited to southern climates, which staff working around the clock will tell you feels like a 1970s time warp.

Of course, federal government buy-in on a project the scale of a new RDH would be pivotal if the NT wants to afford it.

Already, more than 70 per cent of the territory's annual budget revenue comes from Commonwealth funding.

But couldn't a new Darwin hospital be helped along if the NT government took the lead in committing to such a project?

Couldn't the NT government drive forward plans to build a new RDH and give Territorians confidence there is a plan to help pull its health system out of the mire?

Won't it be too much for taxpayers?

Yes, it's a project that is likely going to cost billions of dollars.

But that infrastructure price-tag is not without recent precedent in the jurisdiction.

The NT government is already committed to building a ship lift with a construction budget of more than $800 million, that government sources say could eventually blowout to $1 billion.

A ship lift that is going to be used solely by private industry for private industry revenue.

The government's also continuing with a $100 million State Square centrepiece building in Darwin CBD (just don't call it an art gallery — at least, not yet).

So why not commit to a project that will have long-term benefits for all Territorians, and throw some of those hundreds of millions of dollars towards a new major hospital?

The NT government has a decades-long track record of blaming the federal government for funding shortfalls in the jurisdiction — it's basically a territory tradition to blame Canberra.

But, with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese already calling on the states and territories to reign in their health budgets and spending, rallying the feds for cash may be a tough bargain.

Statements to the ABC from the federal government about whether they would commit to funding a new RDH have so far been vague and noncommittal.

Maybe it's time for some political bravery in the Northern Territory government.

Projects such as the ship lift and the State Square building (projects, it must be said, that were signed off on under the previous Labor government) remain publicly divisive and will only benefit certain portions of the territory population.

A new RDH would benefit all NT residents for generations to come.