Now, despite being a public patient, he is being forced by the Canberra Hospital to pay a daily rate for his care – which will leave him with just $30 a week to live on.

The Canberra Hospital maintains it has to charge the fees under Commonwealth laws and Mr Peers has been informed he could apply to have the fees waived on the basis of financial hardship. But no application had been received. Mr Peers said making an application would mean producing bank statements which he did not want to do because it was "an invasion of privacy".

The disability pensioner has been reclassified as a "nursing home-type patient" because he has been in hospital for more than 35 days, no longer requires acute care and is awaiting alternative living arrangements.

Paralysed from the waist down, he says he can't even use the buzzer because of his withered fingers, so sometimes he has to resort to whistling to get the nurses' attention.

He disputes that he no longer requires acute care and cannot believe he is being billed as a public patient.

"I can't get up, I can't walk around, I can't get a bottle of water, I can't go to the toilet. I can't do any of that," he said.

Mr Peers and his partner Vicki Lilley were told this week he would have to pay $56.90 a day or $398.30 a week for his care in the Canberra Hospital until he could be discharged to go home.

He receives a pension of $860 a fortnight which means he will be left with $30 a week to live on, including paying hefty bills such as his rates.

Mr Peers has been on a disability pension since the early 1990s. He was in London with Ms Lilley on what was meant to be the trip of a lifetime, financed by an inheritance from her mother.

Instead on May 30, 2014, he was paralysed when he sat on a chair in his London hotel to untie his shoelaces to get into bed. The chair was on a rollers on a slippery floor. It shot out from under him, sending him backwards where he hit a desk and broke two vertebrae in his neck.

He also suffered a perforated bowel when being removed from the hotel by paramedics because the strap around his abdomen was so tight and later almost died while being treated in Charing Cross Hospital. His neck is fused by screws and plates and he cannot move his head.

His travel insurance covered his trip back by air ambulance to Australia at a cost of $90,000 in September, 2014. He had further surgery at the Royal North Shore Hospital in Sydney, later transferred to the Prince of Wales Hospital before being moved to the Canberra Hospital on May 11 this year.

None of the other hospitals charged him a cent.

Neither he nor Ms Lilley know when he might be discharged as they are waiting for his home to be modified through the National Disability Insurance Scheme. Ms Lilley said quotes for the work had been done eight months ago but the modifications had not yet started.

The couple was also waiting for a wheelchair ordered by them to arrive from Canada and for carers to be arranged, all to be paid for by the NDIS.

"John would love to go home but through no fault of his own, he needs certain services in place," she said.

Ms Lilley said she had made a request to the hospital for the fees to be waived but the hospital's response was that it was bound by the Commonwealth laws.

An ACT Health spokeswoman said the hospital was aware of Mr Peers' case.

"Public hospitals are bound by the Commonwealth Department of Health to charge 'nursing home'-type patients a private contribution rate, which is set at 87.5 per cent of the pension (plus rental assistance) once a patient has been in hospital for more than 35 days and is no longer considered to need acute hospital care," a statement read.

" A patient requiring 24/7 nursing care does not mean they will fall into an 'acute' category if they are no longer receiving treatment for a particular illness or injury. This fee is charged because acute hospitals need to be able to care for acute patients, and nursing home-type patients can be cared for in non-acute facilities. Occupying an acute bed comes at significant cost to taxpayers, which is why the Commonwealth introduced this contribution fee."

The spokeswoman said the patients could apply under financial hardship to have the fee written off.

"This has been offered to this patient, however no application has been received," she said..

"The hospital did try and communicate the change in care type with this patient, prior to him receiving the letter, however the patient was not receptive to this discussion.

"In relation to the buzzer, ACT Health notes this concern, but recognises that the patient is able to use other devices in the room and therefore considers him able to use the buzzer if needed."

Ms Lilley maintained Mr Peers could not use the television remote or any other device in his hospital room.