Hiya - and welcome! I'm lucky to live in the catchment for a great public hospital and am very happy with the service (other than the dress sense - see above!). The thing that swung it for me, is if anything goes wrong at a private hospital in Melbourne, you end up in the Royal Women's anyway, so why pay to be in the wrong place? I know you get consistency of obstetric care, but they still might have food poisoning/ holiday/ bar mitzvah on your due date and you've wasted ten grand which frankly, I'd rather spend on future education that on consistency of doctor .... but I'm sure others have quite opposite views .....!!!