Aren't we lucky to have public hospitals

Remember we are stuck with lethargic Lemma for at least four years.

SENIOR surgeons are threatening to resign if the Government does not restore Royal North Shore Hospital to its former glory.

Their warning came as the couple who sparked the latest inquiry, Mark Dreyer and Jana Horska, broke down as they relived their ordeal of her miscarrying in the hospital's toilet.

Silence fell over the room as Mr Dreyer detailed the night his wife lost their unborn child on September 25, when Ms Horska was 14weeks pregnant.

"There is no deadline to our ongoing grief and suffering," Mr Dreyer said.

"It has cost both of us terrible grief and we will always be wondering if the outcome would have been different if we had been treated as a priority."

Christian Democrats' leader Fred Nile, the parliamentary inquiry committee's chairman, promised the couple "the inquiry won't fail you".

Mr Dreyer said he had no faith in the Government for implementing change.

"I think people would have had a lot more respect for (Premier) Morris Iemma to come out and take the politics out of it, take away the political spin which has been very hurtful for us," he said.

"The insensitivity has just been unbelievable, they don't understand the pain they cause with this rubbish they peddle."

There is only one more day of public hearings, on Monday, before the committee retires to consider its recommendations. But it has been swamped with damning complaints which doctors from the hospital have said are an embarrassment.....