Blue Card system
Program / SchemeReferenced in 13 bills
Child Protection Reform Amendment Bill 2017
This bill rewrites large parts of Queensland's Child Protection Act 1999 to give children in long-term out-of-home care more stability and to strengthen cultural protections for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children. It introduces a new 'permanent care order' lasting until age 18, limits successive short-term orders to two years, extends support for young people leaving care up to age 25, and simplifies how agencies share information to protect children at risk.
Education (Accreditation of Non-State Schools) Bill 2017
This bill replaces Queensland's 2001 law on non-State school accreditation with a modernised framework. It streamlines how independent and Catholic schools become accredited, gives the Non-State Schools Accreditation Board responsibility for deciding government funding eligibility, and strengthens inspection and investigation powers.
Education (Overseas Students) Bill 2017
This bill replaces Queensland's old overseas students law, creates a new statutory regime for international secondary student exchange programs, and sets up the legal framework for the new senior assessment system and ATAR that began with Year 11 students in 2019. It also makes minor amendments to home education rules, school councils and school terminology.
Disability Services and Other Legislation (NDIS) Amendment Bill 2019
This bill updates Queensland's disability services laws for the full rollout of the National Disability Insurance Scheme from 1 July 2019. It ensures state-level protections for people with disability continue under the new national framework, strengthens criminal screening of disability workers, and maintains coronial oversight and community visitor programs for NDIS participants receiving high-level supports.
Disability Services and Other Legislation (Worker Screening) Amendment Bill 2020
This bill creates a mandatory screening system for people who work with Queenslanders with disability. It implements the nationally agreed NDIS worker screening scheme and establishes a separate state system for disability services funded outside the NDIS. The bill also strengthens how the blue card system works alongside disability screening to protect children with disability.
Public Safety Business Agency and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2016
This bill reshapes the Public Safety Business Agency, which provides shared back-office services to Queensland's police and fire agencies. It sets up a new Board of Management led by the Police and Fire Commissioners, hands some operational functions back to the Queensland Police Service and Queensland Fire and Emergency Services, moves Blue Card Services to the Department of Justice and Attorney-General, and absorbs the State Government Protective Security Service into the police service.
Education and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2026
This bill delivers reforms across Queensland's education and arts portfolios. It reduces red tape for non-state schools, creates a legal framework for programs that re-engage disengaged students, expands international delivery of the Queensland Certificate of Education, modernises governance of five arts statutory bodies, and introduces anti-scalping protections for QPAC ticket resales.
Penalties and Sentences (Sexual Offences) and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2025
This bill makes four sets of changes: it strengthens sentencing for sexual offences based on recommendations from the Queensland Sentencing Advisory Council, creates a new offence for impersonating government agencies, updates crimes at sea laws to match the national scheme, and fixes technical issues in the blue card system for working with children.
Working with Children Legislation (Indigenous Communities) Amendment Bill 2018
This bill proposed giving Indigenous Community Justice Groups the power to approve Blue Cards (working with children checks) for community members who would otherwise be denied due to certain non-sexual criminal offences such as stealing, burglary, and drug offences. It was a private member's bill introduced by Mr R Katter MP. The bill's second reading failed and it did not become law.
Police Powers and Responsibilities and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2021
This bill makes broad changes across policing, corrective services, and child protection law. It tackles knife crime in entertainment precincts, overhauls parole rules for the most serious murderers, strengthens 'No Body, No Parole' laws, creates tougher penalties for harming police and corrective services animals, and updates child sexual abuse offence lists to include modern Commonwealth offences.
Working with Children Legislation (Indigenous Communities) Amendment Bill 2017
This bill would have let Community Justice Groups in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities recommend that a local person be issued a blue card to work with children in their own community, even if a past non-sexual conviction would normally block one. The card would be valid only in that community. The bill was introduced by Mr Robbie Katter MP and lapsed at the end of the 55th Parliament, so it did not become law.
Working with Children (Risk Management and Screening) and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2018
This bill introduces a 'No Card, No Start' policy for Queensland's blue card system, meaning no one can begin paid work with children without first holding a working with children clearance. It also modernises the blue card application process with online options, expands the criminal offences that automatically disqualify a person from working with children, closes loopholes that allowed high-risk people to rely on exemptions, and creates a centralised register of home-based care services.
Working with Children (Indigenous Communities) Amendment Bill 2021
This bill would have created a new Blue Card framework giving Indigenous community justice groups the power to recommend restricted working with children clearances for people in their communities. It aimed to address chronic unemployment in remote Indigenous communities where the standard Blue Card system's inflexibility prevents people with certain past offences from accessing employment, even when the local community considers them safe. The bill's second reading was defeated and it did not become law.