Queensland Council of Unions
OrganisationReferenced in 14 bills
Building Industry Fairness (Security of Payment) and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2020
This bill reforms Queensland's building industry payment protections and regulatory framework. It replaces Project Bank Accounts with a simplified statutory trust system to protect subcontractor payments, strengthens the QBCC's ability to address fraud, introduces a demerit point system for building certifiers, enhances oversight of architects and engineers, and preserves review rights for retirement village transition plans.
Personal Injuries Proceedings and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2022
This bill cracks down on 'claim farming' — the practice of cold-calling people to pressure them into making personal injury or workers' compensation claims, then selling their details to law firms. It also tightens rules on legal billing in personal injury cases, confirms when terminally ill workers can access lump sum compensation, and fixes technical issues with Queensland's political donation caps.
Work Health and Safety and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2023
This bill strengthens Queensland's workplace health and safety laws by implementing recommendations from two major reviews. It enhances the powers and protections of health and safety representatives, makes it easier for registered unions to participate in safety matters, lowers the prosecution threshold for the most serious safety offences from recklessness to negligence, and bans insurance that covers workplace safety fines.
Community Services Industry (Portable Long Service Leave) Bill 2019
This bill creates a portable long service leave scheme for Queensland's community services industry. It allows workers who frequently change employers within the sector — due to short-term funding arrangements and contract-based employment — to accumulate long service leave credits across the industry rather than losing entitlements with each job change. The bill also fixes a loophole in the Industrial Relations Act 2016 so that employees dismissed due to illness are entitled to pro rata long service leave.
Workers' Compensation and Rehabilitation and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2020
This bill makes it easier for first responders to claim workers' compensation for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). It creates a presumptive system where PTSD in eligible workers is automatically assumed to be caused by their work, removing the burden on injured workers to prove the connection. This responds to evidence from Beyond Blue and other reviews that first responders experience mental health conditions at substantially higher rates than the general workforce.
Industrial Relations and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2022
This bill implements 40 recommendations from the five-year review of Queensland's Industrial Relations Act 2016. It strengthens workplace sexual harassment protections, creates new minimum standards for gig economy courier drivers, modernises parental leave entitlements, requires gender pay gap transparency in collective bargaining, and tightens rules around who can claim to represent workers and employers.
Electrical Safety and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2024
This bill updates Queensland's electrical safety and workplace safety laws across several areas. It modernises the electrical safety framework to cover emerging technologies like e-scooters and battery storage systems, strengthens the industrial manslaughter offence to protect bystanders as well as workers, adds negligence as a basis for prosecuting the most serious safety breaches, and gives worker representatives new powers to document workplace hazards with photos and testing equipment.
Holidays and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2019
This bill makes Christmas Eve a part-day public holiday in Queensland from 6pm to midnight. It recognises that Christmas celebrations often begin on the evening of 24 December and ensures workers are either able to refuse work after 6pm or receive penalty rates if they do work.
Summary Offences and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2019
This bill creates new criminal offences for using 'dangerous attachment devices' during protests — specialised equipment like steel tubes, concrete-filled drums, and tripods designed to make it difficult and dangerous for police to remove protesters. It was introduced after a series of climate, mining, and animal welfare protests caused significant disruptions across Queensland, including a $1.3 million cost when a protester delayed coal trains at the Port of Brisbane for 14 hours. The bill passed with amendment.
Workers’ Compensation and Rehabilitation and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2024
This bill reforms Queensland's workers' compensation scheme based on a five-yearly independent review. It strengthens rehabilitation and return-to-work requirements, expands cancer coverage for firefighters, creates faster weekly payments for injured workers, introduces new enforcement tools, and lays groundwork for future gig worker coverage. It also increases flexible parental leave and adds superannuation as a Queensland employment standard.
Public Service and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2020
This bill reforms Queensland's public service employment laws based on the independent Bridgman Review. It makes permanent employment the default for government workers, gives temporary and casual employees new rights to request conversion to permanent roles, and introduces positive performance management principles that require managers to support employees before resorting to discipline.
Integrity and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2023
This bill strengthens Queensland's integrity and anti-corruption framework by implementing recommendations from Professor Peter Coaldrake's review of public sector culture and the Yearbury review of the Integrity Commissioner. It overhauls lobbying regulation, boosts the independence of five core integrity bodies, and extends the Ombudsman's reach to cover non-government organisations delivering public services.
Respect at Work and Other Matters Amendment Bill 2024
This bill makes wide-ranging changes to Queensland's anti-discrimination, sentencing and judicial laws. It strengthens workplace protections against sexual harassment and discrimination, adds new grounds on which people are protected from unfair treatment, and requires employers to actively prevent discrimination. It also increases penalties for violence against workers and clarifies judicial immunity.
Public Sector Bill 2022
This bill replaces the Public Service Act 2008 with a new Public Sector Act that creates a unified employment framework for the entire Queensland public sector. It implements recommendations from two independent reviews — the Bridgman Review into public sector employment laws and the Coaldrake Report on public sector culture and accountability — to make the public sector fairer, more diverse and better governed.