Queensland LNP Government Halts Children's Gender Service Expansion

The Queensland Liberal government has announced it will not continue to fund the expanding of children’s gender services,citing their opposition to transgender healthcare for children. This is despite an independent, third-party evaluation showing those services to be both “safe” and “evidence-based.” The move is yet another example of politicians using transgender children as a political football, and an attempt to bring the US & UK transgender culture war back home.

The Independent Evaluation

Last year, Children’s Health Queensland (CHQ) commissioned a comprehensive external evaluation of its paediatric gender service, the Queensland Children’s Gender Service (QCGS).³ This external review panel—made up of psychiatrists, endocrinologists, general practitioners, researchers, and people with lived experience—operated independently from both CHQ and the government. Their mission was to appraise the safety and quality of the services.

In July 2024, after months of data collection and stakeholder engagement, the panel released its final report—publicly available on the Children’s Health Queensland website—that declared Queensland’s paediatric gender services both safe and evidence-based.

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The panel additionally offered 25 recommendations, including:

• Increasing staffing to reduce waitlists currently totaling nearly 500 children.
• Building a statewide network that would ensure those in rural and remote communities have fair access to care.
• Developing further research to understand long-term outcomes.
• Collaborating with community organisations (NGOs) to strengthen family and peer support.

According to the final report:

“After reviewing the clinical care pathways, the panel concluded that the service provides effective care from referral to discharge and that this care meets consumer needs and aligns with [national and international] guidelines.”

The then Labor Government committed a funding boost of $2.6 million, an almost doubling of the services budget. At the time, the LNP opposition opposed the expansion, citing their opposition to transgender children’s right to healthcare.

Political Football

Despite the independent evaluation’s findings, Deputy Premier Jarrod Bleijie announced the LNP’s decision to halt further “delivery” on the evaluation’s recommendations—effectively halting the proper funding of these gender services, and ensuring long wait-times for children who require this lifesaving care. Bleijie stated that they do “not support the expansion of gender services for children in Queensland,” citing concerns about puberty blockers, an entirely manufactured concern originating with the UK Conservative Government’s Cass Review. A document widely considered to be manufactured and flawed, which only exists to justify removal of healthcare from transgender children.

The LNP is turning a blind eye to expert medical advice in favor of fearmongering and hatred of transgender people.

Looming Concerns and What’s at Stake

Opponents of the freeze on expansion say the existing QCGS waitlist—nearly 500 children as of mid-2024—demonstrates the urgency of service upgrades. However it’s clear that the disagreement the LNP holds is not that the waitlist is long or not, but it is that Bleijie believes that transgender children do not have a right to healthcare.

As the LNP blocks recommended staffing increases and improved statewide access, families could face even longer wait times, forcing desperate parents to seek private or interstate options.

Under the final report’s findings, nearly one-third of children who undergo an initial assessment at the QCGS do not need puberty blockers or hormone treatment; they simply need supportive counseling or mental health care. Halting the service’s growth prevents those very kids, the ones that the LNP is aiming to protect (cis children who wouldn’t otherwise transition), from accessing the mental health services they need.

It’s important that we don’t overstate the importance of those cis kids receiving and being directed to appropriate care, because the great majority of children referred to the service are transgender and are just as much worthy of care and respect.

Far-right figures have celebrated this policy reversal. Anti-trans extremist Psychiatrist Jillian Spencer, who has publicly opposed gender-affirming treatments for minors, likened the next step to “decommissioning” the entire clinic, while other anti-transgender extremists call for outright bans on transgender healthcare; seeing this as the next step towards ending (the lives of) trans people.