Cairns
PlaceReferenced in 15 bills
Waste Reduction and Recycling (Waste Levy) and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2018
This bill introduces a waste disposal levy in Queensland, starting at $70 per tonne from 4 March 2019, to discourage sending waste to landfill and boost recycling. The levy funds a $100 million Resource Recovery Industry Development Program and stops Queensland being used as a cheap dumping ground for interstate waste.
Victims' Commissioner and Sexual Violence Review Board Bill 2024
This bill establishes a Victims' Commissioner as an independent statutory officer to promote and protect the rights of victims of crime in Queensland. It also creates the Sexual Violence Review Board to examine systemic problems in how sexual offences are reported, investigated and prosecuted. The bill transfers the Charter of Victims' Rights from the Victims of Crime Assistance Act 2009 and gives the Commissioner power to handle complaints when victims' rights are breached.
Local Government Electoral (Implementing Stage 1 of Belcarra) and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2018
This bill bans political donations from property developers to candidates, councillors, political parties and third parties at both state and local government levels in Queensland. It also significantly strengthens the rules for how local government councillors must declare and manage conflicts of interest, following recommendations from the Crime and Corruption Commission's Operation Belcarra investigation into corruption risks in local government.
Work Health and Safety and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2023
This bill overhauls Queensland's workplace health and safety framework by implementing recommendations from two major reviews. It strengthens health and safety representatives, gives registered unions a direct role in workplace safety matters, makes it easier to prosecute the most serious safety offences by adding negligence as a fault element, and bans insurance against WHS fines.
Pharmacy Business Ownership Bill 2023
This bill replaces Queensland's 20-year-old pharmacy ownership laws with a modern regulatory framework. It establishes a new independent Queensland Pharmacy Business Ownership Council to oversee pharmacy ownership, introduces mandatory annual licensing for pharmacy owners, and bans new pharmacies from opening inside supermarkets.
Land Tax and Other Legislation (Empty Homes Levy) Amendment Bill 2022
This bill would have created an empty homes levy in Queensland, charging property owners 5% of the market value of residential properties left vacant for more than six months each year. It was a private member's bill introduced by Greens MP Dr Amy MacMahon during the housing crisis, modelled on Vancouver's Empty Homes Levy. The bill was discharged and did not become law.
Justice and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2023
This bill makes wide-ranging changes across Queensland's justice system, courts, electoral processes, and victims' rights. Major reforms include formally recognising the deaths of unborn children in criminal sentencing, allowing media to identify sexual offence defendants before committal, improving accountability for Justices of the Peace, modernising legal costs disclosure, and saving postal votes affected by envelope errors.
Crocodile Control and Conservation Bill 2024
This bill sought to establish a Queensland Crocodile Authority based in Cairns to take over all crocodile management in the state. It aimed to make North Queensland waterways safer by creating zero-tolerance zones where crocodiles must be removed, while also expanding the crocodile farming and egg harvesting industry. This bill was discharged and did not become law.
Crocodile Control, Conservation and Safety Bill 2024
This bill sought to establish a Queensland Crocodile Authority based in Cairns to take over all crocodile management in the state. It prioritised human safety by creating zero-tolerance zones where crocodiles would be immediately removed from populated waterways, while also expanding the crocodile farming and egg harvesting industry. This was a private member's bill that lapsed at the end of the 57th Parliament and did not become law.
Safer Waterways Bill 2018
This bill sought to create a Queensland Crocodile Authority based in Cairns to manage saltwater crocodile populations across the state. It responded to growing community concern about increasing crocodile numbers and attacks in North Queensland, with 25 recorded attacks between 1985 and 2015 (seven fatal) and three attacks in the year before the bill was introduced (two fatal). The bill's second reading failed and it did not become law.
Youth Justice (Monitoring Devices) Amendment Bill 2025
This bill extends Queensland's trial of electronic monitoring devices for children on bail by one year, to 30 April 2026. The trial allows courts to order children aged 15 and over who are charged with serious offences and have a history of offending to wear a monitoring device as a condition of bail. The extension gives the government time to properly evaluate whether the devices are effective before deciding the trial's future.
Crocodile Control and Conservation Bill 2025
This bill sought to establish a Queensland Crocodile Authority based in Cairns to manage all aspects of crocodile control and conservation in the state. It responded to rising crocodile numbers and sightings in North Queensland by creating zero-tolerance zones in populated waterways where crocodiles would be immediately killed or relocated, while also building a sustainable crocodile industry through egg harvesting and farming. The bill was introduced as a private member's bill and its second reading failed — it did not become law.
Meriba Omasker Kaziw Kazipa (Torres Strait Islander Traditional Child Rearing Practice) Bill 2020
This bill creates Australia's first legal framework to recognise Torres Strait Islander traditional child rearing practice (Ailan Kastom), where children are permanently placed with cultural parents within the extended family network. It establishes a Commissioner to decide applications for cultural recognition orders that legally transfer parentage, resulting in new birth certificates that reflect a person's cultural identity.
Criminal Law (Raising the Age of Responsibility) Amendment Bill 2021
This bill sought to raise Queensland's minimum age of criminal responsibility from 10 to 14 years old, consistent with United Nations standards and medical evidence that children under 14 lack the brain development to fully understand the consequences of their actions. It was a private member's bill introduced by Michael Berkman MP (Greens) that failed at its second reading vote and did not become law.
Revenue and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2019
This bill implements 2019-20 Queensland Budget revenue measures across land tax, payroll tax, and petroleum royalties. It raises the payroll tax exemption threshold to help smaller businesses, introduces a higher payroll tax rate for large employers, increases land tax on large corporate landholdings and foreign owners, lifts the petroleum royalty rate, and provides a payroll tax discount for regional employers.