Office of the Public Guardian
OrganisationReferenced in 12 bills
Health and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2022
This bill amends eight health-related Acts to strengthen protections for public health workers, modernise cancer data collection, enable electronic recording of Mental Health Review Tribunal proceedings, expand school vision screening, streamline organ donation consent, and update various administrative processes across Queensland's health system.
Corrective Services (Emerging Technologies and Security) and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2022
This bill modernises Queensland's corrective services and youth detention laws to address emerging security threats and improve emergency preparedness. It creates new criminal offences for flying drones over prisons and youth detention centres, authorises x-ray body scanners and surveillance devices, overhauls the emergency declaration framework to cover disasters and pandemics, and strengthens information sharing between corrective services and partner agencies.
Disability Services and Other Legislation (NDIS) Amendment Bill 2019
This bill updates Queensland's disability services laws to work alongside the national NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission, which commenced in Queensland on 1 July 2019. It ensures that important state-level protections for people with disability — including worker screening, authorisation of restrictive practices, coronial oversight of deaths in care, and community visitor programs — continue under the new national framework.
Public Trustee (Advisory and Monitoring Board) Amendment Bill 2021
This bill creates an independent advisory and monitoring board to oversee the Public Trustee of Queensland. It responds to the Public Advocate's 2021 report which found the Public Trustee needed greater transparency and accountability in how it manages the financial affairs of vulnerable Queenslanders, particularly people with impaired decision-making capacity.
Inspector of Detention Services Bill 2021
This bill creates an independent Inspector of Detention Services to oversee Queensland's prisons, youth detention centres, community corrections centres, work camps and police watch-houses. The Inspector, held by the Queensland Ombudsman, will conduct regular inspections and reviews of detention facilities and report findings directly to Parliament, with the aim of preventing harm and improving conditions for people in custody.
Child Protection Reform and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2021
This bill makes wide-ranging reforms to Queensland's child protection system and blue card (working with children check) framework. It strengthens the rights of children in care, ensures their voices are genuinely heard in decisions affecting them, modernises the regulation of foster, kinship and licensed care, and connects Queensland to a national system for screening people who work with children.
Guardianship and Administration and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2018
This bill modernises Queensland's guardianship laws to better protect adults who cannot make decisions for themselves, while also fixing unrelated issues with government integrity and corruption reporting. It implements recommendations from the Queensland Law Reform Commission's five-year review of guardianship law and the Age Friendly Community Action Plan.
Disability Services (Restrictive Practices) and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2024
This bill reforms Queensland's framework for authorising the use of restrictive practices (such as physical restraint, chemical restraint, seclusion and containment) for people with disability. It replaces the current guardianship-based system with a clinician-based model centred on a new, independent Senior Practitioner who will make all authorisation decisions. The bill also expands protections to include children with disability and aligns Queensland's approach with national NDIS standards.
Youth Justice and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2019
This bill reforms Queensland's youth justice system by creating stronger bail protections for children, reducing the time young people spend in custody on remand, and banning electronic tracking devices on children. It implements the Queensland Government's Youth Justice Strategy 2019-2023 and its principle that detention should be a last resort for young people.
Working with Children (Risk Management and Screening) and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2018
This bill implements Queensland's 'No Card, No Start' policy, requiring everyone to hold a blue card (working with children clearance) before starting child-related work. It modernises the blue card application process with online applications, creates a register of home-based care services to better monitor children's safety in foster care, kinship care and family day care settings, and expands the list of offences that permanently disqualify a person from working with children.
Child Safe Organisations Bill 2024
This bill creates a mandatory child safe organisations system for Queensland, requiring organisations that work with children to meet 10 child safe standards and to report and investigate allegations of child abuse by their workers. It implements key recommendations from the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, with the Queensland Family and Child Commission overseeing the system.
Health and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2021
This bill makes broad amendments across Queensland's health legislation, with the most significant changes strengthening rights and protections for mental health patients. It reforms electroconvulsive therapy approval processes, adopts a stronger rights-based approach for patient transfers, improves support for victims of unlawful acts, and expands allied health professionals' access to patient information. It also allows health students to assist in pregnancy terminations and clarifies that human milk is not regulated as human tissue.