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Whistleblower psychiatrist Dr Jillian Spencer has been dismissed from Queensland Health after raising the concerns, even as Dr Michelle Telfer, a leading gender clinician rebuked by the Family Court, was exonerated by Australia’s medical regulator.

Queensland child psychiatrist Dr Jillian Spencer has been sacked after warning that puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones pose serious risks to children, even as multiple legal challenges about her whistleblower status remain unresolved.

Suspended from clinical duties since 2023, Dr Spencer said she was given a termination notice a month before an independent panel delivers its findings into transgender medical practices.

“My lawyers and I were gutted to receive the termination notice. It’s taken us quite a few days to process it,” Dr Spencer said, in exclusive comments to The Daily Declaration. “I’ve got 14 days to respond to say why I shouldn’t be fired. However, I don’t expect the hospital will show any compassion towards me.”

“I think the hospital knows that it will only get harder to justify firing me if the Vine Review concludes that there is a lack of evidence of benefit and serious harms from puberty blockers and cross sex hormones,” she added, continuing:

It’s a huge shock that they are firing me before the outcome of my whistleblower claim through the Queensland Industrial Relations Commission. That is unfair because, if I’m found to have blown the whistle, I was fully within my rights to speak to the media. They’re firing me for things I’ve said in the media. Being a whistleblower would protect me from such reprisals.

My segment on Credlin tonight where I explain that my disciplinary matters make me feel like I’m on a plane with hijackers who want me to stay quiet and not resist while they do something awful. Once again, I ask @TimNichollsMP to intervene to stop the Queensland Children’s… pic.twitter.com/4aPpq7pTBY

— Jillian Spencer (@Jilliantweeting) September 15, 2025

Dr Spencer’s professional association, the Red Union Support Hub (RUSH), has accused the Queensland government of a miscarriage of justice. Chairman Graeme Haycroft said, “Jillian Spencer has been badly done by. It is a miscarriage of justice. This goes to the core of the cultural problems within Queensland Health.”

“Is the hospital trying to silence me; get rid of me in advance of any external scrutiny?” she said, the Courier Mail reported on Friday. “Don’t we want doctors to speak up when there is harm to children?”

Her 59-page termination letter claimed she breached the code of conduct, including by speaking on Sky News and at public meetings.

However, Dr Spencer has rejected those accusations: “I’m happy for my conduct and behaviours to be examined (in court). People will find that I did everything I could to try to protect children. I’m proud of what I did. I’m sad it may [be] the ending of my career.”

She has argued that her actions were motivated by concern for vulnerable young people. “I have been a strong voice to try to protect children, and I am still getting punished for that,” she explained.

She said hospital administrators were attempting to suppress scrutiny: “They are using the code of conduct to stop me speaking out about a medical scandal. I have to criticise the hospital because it is responsible for the medical scandal.”

Unequal Treatment Raises Questions

The move against Dr Jillian Spencer stands in sharp contrast to the treatment of Dr Michelle Telfer, chief of medicine at the Royal Children’s Hospital Melbourne.

On September 12, the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency (AHPRA) dismissed a complaint against Dr Telfer, finding she was “meeting accepted standards of practice”.

This came despite an April Family Court ruling that criticised Dr Telfer’s evidence as that of a “trans rights advocate” rather than an objective medical witness.

Justice Andrew Strum found the Melbourne gender clinic offered no alternative to puberty blockers and questioned the advice of the 2018 treatment guidelines, which recommended even young children with gender distress be “unreservedly affirmed”.

The different outcomes have drawn sharp criticism. Bernard Lane of Gender Clinic News wrote that “the contrast between the treatment of Michelle Telfer and Jillian Spencer should trouble anyone with a passing interest in clinical governance and regulatory oversight.”

He added, “One practitioner authors the very guidelines now under judicial fire, yet sails on untouched by disciplinary sanction; the other raises uncomfortable questions … and finds herself suspended, isolated, professionally caught in a state of perpetual limbo.”

The independent review chaired by psychiatrist Professor Ruth Vine is due to hand its findings to Health Minister Tim Nicholls by November 30. In the meantime, Queensland Health has paused new hormonal treatment at the state’s gender clinic.

“What they did to me was an incredibly intimidating message to other psychiatrists, telling them to stay quiet about the harm being done to children,” Dr Spencer further told The Daily Declaration.

“I spoke up because I naively believed all the hospital’s marketing department spin about its positive values and overarching mission related to patient care and the mandatory training for clinicians — encouraging clinicians to speak up for safety.”

Dr Spencer believes her warnings were necessary in a climate where safety concerns had long been ignored.

“When I first raised concerns in 2023 it was a culture of fear and silence,” she said. “In the last two years that all changed and many people had raised the alarm. It’s now common knowledge that gender affirming care is harmful to children.”