Penalties and Sentences Act 1992
LegislationReferenced in 66 bills
Strong and Sustainable Resource Communities Bill 2016
This bill requires large mining and gas projects in Queensland to share the benefits with the regional towns near them. It bans future projects from staffing their entire operational workforce as fly-in fly-out (FIFO), makes it illegal to discriminate against local residents when hiring, and requires every project to do a social impact assessment. It also permanently bans underground coal gasification (UCG), a controversial gas-extraction method.
Mines Legislation (Resources Safety) Amendment Bill 2017
This bill strengthens safety and health laws for Queensland mines in response to the re-emergence of black lung disease. It delivers 15 improvements including higher penalties, proactive duties on company directors, a new civil penalty regime, mandatory safety systems for small opal and gem mines, and broader inspector powers.
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.
Fisheries (Sustainable Fisheries Strategy) Amendment Bill 2018
This bill overhauls Queensland's fisheries management by introducing harvest strategies as the key tool for managing fish stocks, strengthening enforcement against black marketing of seafood, and formally recognising charter fishing and Indigenous fishing in the law. It implements the Queensland Sustainable Fisheries Strategy 2017-2027, backed by $20.9 million in funding for better monitoring, compliance and stakeholder engagement.
Justice and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2026
This bill is a wide-ranging omnibus that tackles metal theft with new criminal offences and penalties up to 25 years imprisonment, improves the coronial system to handle deaths in custody more efficiently and cover deaths of people with disability receiving Commonwealth supports, raises the District Court's civil jurisdiction from $750,000 to $1.5 million, and makes numerous other updates to justice and administrative legislation including repealing the Brisbane Casino Agreement Act.
Health Practitioner Regulation National Law and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2018
This bill reforms how health practitioners who treat other health practitioners handle mandatory reporting, and toughens penalties for people who pretend to be registered health professionals. It was agreed by all Australian health ministers through COAG and applies nationally, with Queensland as the host jurisdiction.
Domestic and Family Violence Protection and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2025
This bill reforms Queensland's response to domestic and family violence by giving police the power to issue 12-month protection directions without going to court, piloting GPS electronic monitoring for high-risk perpetrators, and expanding video-recorded evidence across all Magistrates Courts statewide. It aims to reduce the operational burden on police while providing faster, longer-term protection for victim-survivors.
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.
Criminal Law Amendment Bill 2016
This bill removes the so-called 'gay panic' defence by stopping killers from using an unwanted sexual advance as grounds for reducing murder to manslaughter, except in exceptional cases. It also packages a long list of other criminal law tidy-ups, covering criminal proceeds confiscation, court evidence, juries, Magistrates Court procedure, and sentencing enforcement.
Expanding Adult Crime, Adult Time and Taking a Strong Stance on Drugs and Anti-Social Behaviour Amendment Bill 2026
This bill expands the Adult Crime, Adult Time youth sentencing scheme to 12 additional serious offences, replaces the existing police drug diversion program with a stricter one-chance framework, and creates new Designated Business and Community Precincts where police have enhanced powers to tackle anti-social behaviour.
Criminal Code (Serious Vilification and Hate Crimes) and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2023
This bill strengthens Queensland's hate crime laws by creating higher penalties for offences motivated by hatred based on race, religion, sexuality, sex characteristics or gender identity. It also bans the public display of hate symbols like Nazi imagery, and makes it easier to prosecute serious vilification offences. The bill implements recommendations from the Legal Affairs and Safety Committee's inquiry into serious vilification and hate crimes.
Corrective Services (Emerging Technologies and Security) and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2022
This bill modernises Queensland's corrective services and youth justice legislation to address emerging security threats and improve emergency preparedness. It criminalises drone use over prisons and youth detention centres, authorises new search and surveillance technologies, strengthens information sharing between agencies, and creates a comprehensive emergency response framework for correctional facilities.
Making Queensland Safer Bill 2024
This bill implements the government's 'adult crime, adult time' policy, allowing children convicted of serious offences like murder, robbery, burglary and dangerous driving to receive the same penalties as adults. It also removes the principle of detention as a last resort, makes victim impact the primary consideration in sentencing young offenders, and creates an automatic process to transfer 18-year-olds from youth detention to adult prisons.
Justice and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2019
This bill amends over 30 Acts and regulations within the justice portfolio to improve how Queensland's courts, tribunals, and administrative agencies operate. It modernises the coronial system, strengthens protections for vulnerable witnesses, speeds up the handling of property offences, and fixes various anomalies across the justice system.
Exhibited Animals Bill 2015
This bill creates a single law for exhibiting animals in Queensland, covering zoos, wildlife parks, aquariums, circuses and mobile animal shows. It replaces four overlapping Acts with one exhibition licence and a new legal duty to minimise animal welfare, biosecurity and public safety risks.
Criminal Code (Child Sexual Offences Reform) and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2019
This bill reforms Queensland's criminal justice system to better protect children from sexual abuse and improve access to justice for survivors. It implements key recommendations from the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, strengthens sentencing for child exploitation material offences, and criminalises child abuse objects such as life-like child replicas.
Criminal Code (Consent and Mistake of Fact) and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2020
This bill makes changes across several unrelated areas of Queensland law. It clarifies sexual consent provisions in the Criminal Code following a Queensland Law Reform Commission review, bans online wagering sign-up inducements, strengthens alcohol-fuelled violence measures including longer police banning notices and tighter ID scanning, and ensures victims of solicitor dishonesty receive full compensation from the Legal Practitioners' Fidelity Guarantee Fund.
Child Protection (Offender Reporting and Offender Prohibition Order) and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2022
This bill updates Queensland's child protection offender registry scheme to address technology-based offending that has become more prevalent since the COVID-19 pandemic. It strengthens police monitoring powers over convicted child sex offenders, particularly their use of digital devices, anonymising software, and online platforms.
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.
Youth Justice and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2021
This bill tightens bail rules for serious repeat young offenders, gives police new powers to scan for knives in Gold Coast entertainment precincts, and makes it harder for hooning drivers to avoid identification. It responds to a small cohort of recidivist youth offenders responsible for nearly half of all youth crime, tragic knife murders in Surfers Paradise, and ongoing community concerns about dangerous driving.
Court and Civil Legislation Amendment Bill 2017
This bill bundles many small justice-portfolio reforms into one Act. It speeds up how courts and tribunals work, brings Queensland's film and game classification laws in line with the national scheme, strengthens the Ombudsman, creates an automatic domestic violence notation on criminal records, and updates a long list of rules on wills, trusts, legal practice and retail shop leases.
Revenue and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2018
This bill amends a wide range of Queensland legislation covering tax administration, electronic property conveyancing, fine enforcement, alcohol restrictions in Indigenous communities, cultural heritage protections, and the Cross River Rail project. It is administered by the Deputy Premier, Treasurer and Minister for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Partnerships.
Termination of Pregnancy Bill 2018
This bill decriminalises termination of pregnancy in Queensland by removing century-old Criminal Code offences and creating a new health-based legal framework. Based on 28 recommendations from the Queensland Law Reform Commission, it allows medical practitioners to perform terminations on request up to 22 weeks gestation, with clinical safeguards for later terminations. It also establishes safe access zones around clinics and protects women from criminal liability.
Community Based Sentences (Interstate Transfer) Bill 2019
This bill establishes Queensland's participation in a national scheme for transferring community based sentences — such as probation, community service and intensive correction orders — between Australian states and territories. It replaces informal interstate supervision arrangements that had no enforcement powers, ensuring offenders who move interstate can be properly supervised and held accountable for breaches in their new jurisdiction.
Criminal Justice Legislation (Sexual Violence and Other Matters) Amendment Bill 2024
This bill implements the third wave of reforms from the Women's Safety and Justice Taskforce, focusing on sexual violence and improving how women and girls experience the criminal justice system. It creates new offences to protect young people from sexual exploitation by people in authority, strengthens protections for vulnerable witnesses, allows expert evidence to help juries understand victim behaviour, and modernises rules about how past behaviour evidence can be used in criminal trials.
Youth Justice and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2016
This bill undoes tougher youth justice laws from 2012 and 2014 and returns to a more rehabilitative approach. It closes youth justice proceedings to the public (but lets victims attend), raises the age for transfer to adult prison from 17 to 18, and brings back court-referred restorative justice conferencing as a way to divert young offenders from the formal court system.
Transport and Other Legislation (Personalised Transport Reform) Amendment Bill 2017
This bill sets up a new regulatory framework for taxis, limousines and ride-booking services like Uber in Queensland. It creates new licence and authorisation categories, imposes a chain of responsibility for safety across the industry, and strengthens penalties for unlicensed services.
Police Powers and Responsibilities and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2023
This bill makes several changes to policing and emergency services laws in Queensland. It expands the Police Drug Diversion Program so people caught with small quantities of any dangerous drug — not just cannabis — can be diverted to health services instead of going to court. It also increases the maximum penalty for drug trafficking to life imprisonment, creates tougher penalties for evading police in dangerous circumstances, and introduces a new offence for assaulting fire and emergency services workers.
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.
Mines Legislation (Resources Safety) Amendment Bill 2018
This bill strengthens safety and health protections for workers in Queensland's coal mining, quarrying, and metalliferous mining sectors. Prompted by the re-identification of coal workers' pneumoconiosis (black lung disease), it increases penalties for safety breaches, introduces civil penalties for corporations, requires company directors to proactively ensure safety compliance, and improves disease reporting and health surveillance for current and former mine workers.
State Penalties Enforcement Amendment Bill 2017
This bill overhauls how Queensland collects unpaid fines through the State Penalties Enforcement Registry (SPER). It creates Work and Development Orders so people in hardship can clear their fines through unpaid work, medical treatment, counselling or courses instead of paying cash, while giving SPER stronger tools against people who refuse to engage.
Criminal Law (Domestic Violence) Amendment Bill (No. 2) 2015
This bill responds to the Not Now, Not Ever report by the Special Taskforce on Domestic and Family Violence. It creates a new criminal offence of strangulation in a domestic setting, makes domestic violence an aggravating factor that increases sentences, and restores the power of lawyers to suggest specific sentences to the court.
Corrective Services and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2020
This bill strengthens anti-corruption measures in Queensland prisons following the Crime and Corruption Commission's Taskforce Flaxton report, reforms the parole system based on the Queensland Parole System Review, creates a permanent firearms amnesty, and regulates the possession of replica firearms including gel blasters.
Tobacco and Other Smoking Products (Dismantling Illegal Trade) and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2025
This bill gives Queensland Health significantly stronger powers to shut down shops selling illegal tobacco and vapes, and hold their landlords accountable. It responds to the rapid growth of the illicit tobacco and vaping market, which is increasingly linked to organised crime and poses serious public health risks, particularly for young people.
Health and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2016
This bill makes a set of changes across health, research and criminal law. It equalises Queensland's age of consent at 16 for all sexual activity, gives GPs access to hospital records through a system called The Viewer, streamlines research use of patient data, lets schools share student details with immunisation and dental providers, and frees QIMR Berghofer to pay research bonuses up to $10 million a year without Cabinet approval.
Corrective Services (Parole Board) and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2017
This bill replaces Queensland's three separate parole boards with a single, professionalised Parole Board Queensland led by a former judge. It also gives corrective services officers clearer power to electronically monitor parolees through GPS devices and curfews. The reforms respond to the 2016 Sofronoff review of the parole system.
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.
Youth Justice and Other Legislation (Inclusion of 17-year-old Persons) Amendment Bill 2016
This bill raises the age of a 'child' in Queensland's youth justice system from under 17 to under 18, so 17-year-olds are treated as young people rather than adults in the criminal justice system. It also sets up transitional rules to move 17-year-olds currently in adult prisons, on remand or in adult court proceedings into the youth justice system. Queensland was the last state to treat 17-year-olds as adults, and the change aligns with national practice and the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.
Criminal Law (Domestic Violence) Amendment Bill 2015
This bill toughens Queensland's response to domestic violence by increasing penalties for breaching protection orders, flagging domestic violence offences on criminal histories, and giving victims better protections when they give evidence in court. It delivers three recommendations from the 'Not Now, Not Ever' Taskforce report on domestic and family violence.
Penalties and Sentences (Queensland Sentencing Advisory Council) Amendment Bill 2016
This bill re-establishes the Queensland Sentencing Advisory Council, an independent body that advises on sentencing, researches how sentences are set, and seeks community views. The council had been created in 2010 and dissolved in 2012; this bill brings it back in permanent legislation.
Criminal Code (Decriminalising Sex Work) and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2024
This bill decriminalises sex work in Queensland by repealing criminal offences that made most forms of sex work illegal and abolishing the brothel licensing system. It implements recommendations from the Queensland Law Reform Commission to treat sex work as legitimate work, while introducing new offences specifically targeting the exploitation of children and coercion in commercial sexual services.
Respect at Work and Other Matters Amendment Bill 2024
This bill makes major reforms to Queensland's anti-discrimination laws, implementing recommendations from the national Respect@Work inquiry, the QHRC's Building Belonging review, and parliamentary committee reports on vilification. It also strengthens sentencing for workplace violence, clarifies judicial immunity, and gives magistrates access to parental leave.
Youth Justice and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2019
This bill reforms Queensland's youth justice laws to keep more children out of custody and ensure they receive appropriate support. It creates a new bail framework with a clear presumption in favour of releasing children, bans electronic tracking devices on young people, enables better information sharing between government agencies and service providers, and authorises body-worn cameras in youth detention centres.
Health Legislation Amendment Bill 2025
This bill puts frontline clinicians onto Queensland's Hospital and Health Boards and strengthens enforcement against illegal vaping. It requires each hospital board to include at least one doctor, nurse, or allied health professional who works at that hospital, and it allows seized vaping goods to be immediately destroyed rather than stored for weeks in expensive, hazardous conditions.
Bail (Domestic Violence) and Another Act Amendment Bill 2017
This bill strengthens protections for domestic violence victims by making it harder for accused offenders to get bail and giving victims more information about what happens next. It reverses the presumption in favour of bail for domestic violence offences, allows GPS tracking as a bail condition, and requires victims to be notified when a defendant applies for or is granted bail.
Liquor and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2017
This bill rolls back two key parts of Queensland's 2016 alcohol-fuelled violence laws after an interim review found venues were routinely working around them. It scraps the 1am lock-out and the two-tier '3am safe night precinct' system, keeping a uniform 3am last drinks across all 15 precincts, while tightening the rules on one-off late-night trading permits and letting courts ban drug traffickers and suppliers from licensed areas.
Domestic and Family Violence Protection (Combating Coercive Control) and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2022
This bill strengthens Queensland's response to domestic and family violence by implementing recommendations from the Women's Safety and Justice Taskforce. It recognises coercive control as a pattern of behaviour, modernises stalking laws to cover technology-facilitated abuse, reforms how courts handle competing domestic violence claims, and improves evidence rules so juries better understand DFV dynamics. It also makes unrelated changes to the Coroners Act, Oaths Act, and Telecommunications Interception Act.
Serious and Organised Crime Legislation Amendment Bill 2016
This bill dismantles Queensland's 2013 anti-bikie laws and replaces them with a new Organised Crime Regime. It repeals the VLAD Act and Criminal Organisation Act 2009, removes mandatory minimum penalties targeting gang members, and introduces a new consorting offence, control orders, public safety orders and a mandatory seven-year jail 'top-up' for serious organised crime. It also toughens laws on online child exploitation, boiler-room fraud and drug trafficking, and restores fair process rights for people applying for licences in regulated industries such as tattooing and security.
Tow Truck Bill 2023
This bill replaces Queensland's 50-year-old Tow Truck Act 1973 with a modernised framework for regulating tow trucks that remove crashed, seized or privately parked vehicles. It introduces a unified accreditation system, increases penalties for non-compliance, and strengthens consumer protections for motorists who may be vulnerable after a crash or whose vehicle has been towed from private property.
Criminal Code and Other Legislation (Mason Jett Lee) Amendment Bill 2019
This bill sought to introduce mandatory minimum prison sentences for the murder of children and create a new criminal offence of 'child homicide'. Named after Mason Jett Lee, a toddler who was killed, it aimed to ensure sentencing for child deaths reflects community expectations and aligns with other Australian jurisdictions. The bill was defeated at the second reading and did not become law.
Justice Legislation (Links to Terrorist Activity) Amendment Bill 2018
This bill implements a national agreement to make it much harder for people with links to terrorism to get bail or parole in Queensland. It amends four Acts to create a presumption against bail and parole for anyone convicted of a terrorism offence or subject to a Commonwealth control order, requiring them to prove exceptional circumstances before being released.
Criminal Code and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2019
This bill strengthens Queensland's criminal law response to child homicide, following a Sentencing Advisory Council inquiry that found community expectations were not being met. It requires courts to treat a child's vulnerability as an aggravating factor in manslaughter sentencing, expands the definition of murder to include reckless indifference to human life, and increases the maximum penalty for failing to supply necessaries to dependants from 3 to 7 years.
Planning Bill 2015
This bill replaces Queensland's entire planning and development system with a simpler framework, repealing the Sustainable Planning Act 2009 and introducing a new Planning Act. It reduces red tape, streamlines how councils make planning schemes, clarifies the rules for approving or refusing development applications, and increases penalties for breaking planning laws.
Health Legislation Amendment Bill 2015
This bill changes six Queensland health laws at once. Its main change is a new menu labelling scheme that requires large fast-food chains, cafe and bakery chains and supermarkets to show kilojoule information on their menus. It also lets health authorities publicly name unsafe food businesses, makes it easier to fill temporary vacancies on health boards, gives registered midwives direct access to the Pap Smear Register, and clarifies that cord blood can be donated to stem-cell registries.
Tackling Alcohol-Fuelled Violence Legislation Amendment Bill 2015
This bill targets alcohol-fuelled violence by cutting late-night liquor trading hours, banning rapid intoxication drinks after midnight, and stopping new extended trading approvals for takeaway alcohol. It also reforms drug and alcohol bail conditions to focus on treatment instead of punishment, and tidies up a range of liquor rules covering craft beer, community clubs, bed and breakfasts and car park events.
Criminal Law (Coercive Control and Affirmative Consent) and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2023
This bill makes coercive control a criminal offence in Queensland and introduces an affirmative model of consent for sexual offences. It implements recommendations from the Women's Safety and Justice Taskforce to better protect victims of domestic, family and sexual violence, while also reforming how courts handle bail, sentencing and evidence in these cases.
Penalties and Sentences (Drug and Alcohol Treatment Orders) and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2017
This bill brings back a drug court in Queensland by creating a new sentencing option called a Drug and Alcohol Treatment Order. Designated magistrates can suspend a prison sentence of up to four years while the offender completes a court-supervised treatment program of at least two years. The bill also tightens the dangerous drug definition, clarifies that long prison sentences can never be 'spent', and gives extra court protections to victims of domestic strangulation.
Fighting Antisemitism and Keeping Guns out of the Hands of Terrorists and Criminals Amendment Bill 2026
This bill responds to the December 2025 Bondi Beach terrorist attack by strengthening Queensland's laws against hate speech and antisemitism, and significantly toughening firearms regulations. It bans hate symbols of terrorist organisations, criminalises prohibited expressions that incite hatred, creates new protections for worshippers at religious sites, and imposes some of Australia's strongest penalties for weapons offences including new crimes targeting 3D-printed firearms.
Victims of Crime Assistance and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2023
This bill increases the financial assistance available to victims of violent crime in Queensland, with the maximum payment for primary victims rising from $75,000 to $120,000. It recognises the seriousness of domestic and family violence by boosting the special assistance payment for those victim-survivors from $1,000 to $9,000. These are the first increases to most victim assistance caps since 2009.
Queensland Community Safety Bill 2024
This bill implements a wide-ranging package of community safety reforms across policing, criminal law, weapons regulation, youth justice, domestic violence protections, and road safety. It expands police powers to scan for knives in more public places, introduces Firearm Prohibition Orders against high-risk individuals, creates new offences to protect emergency workers, and establishes a framework for removing criminal content from social media.
Electoral and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2019
This bill reforms Queensland's electoral laws to improve transparency, modernise voting operations, and align with four-year fixed parliamentary terms. It implements recommendations from the Crime and Corruption Commission's Operation Belcarra report and an independent review of the 2016 elections, requiring disclosure of the true source of political donations and making it easier for voters to cast absentee and postal votes.
Weapons and Other Legislation (Firearms Offences) Amendment Bill 2019
This bill proposed to crack down on firearms crime by introducing Firearm Prohibition Orders, creating new offences for shooting at buildings and possessing 3D gun blueprints, and significantly increasing penalties for weapons offences. It was a private member's bill introduced by Trevor Watts MP and lapsed at the end of the 56th Parliament without becoming law.
Making Queensland Safer (Adult Crime, Adult Time) Amendment Bill 2025
This bill expands Queensland's 'Adult Crime, Adult Time' policy by adding 20 serious offences to the list of crimes for which young offenders can be sentenced as adults. It is part of the Government's Making Queensland Safer Plan and follows advice from an Expert Legal Panel. The bill also improves victim notification arrangements.
Trading (Allowable Hours) Amendment Bill 2017
This bill rewrites Queensland's shop trading hours rules, replacing dozens of separate orders with a single set of hours written directly into the Trading (Allowable Hours) Act 1990. It allows more shops to open longer and more consistently across the state, adds new types of exempt shops, and protects workers who don't want to work the extra hours.
Victims of Crime Assistance and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2016
This bill strengthens support for victims of crime in Queensland. It makes financial assistance easier to claim, extends it to victims of domestic and family violence including elder abuse and economic abuse, and creates a new Charter of Victims' Rights. It also introduces legal protection for sexual assault counselling records and automatically treats sexual offence victims as 'special witnesses' in court.
Youth Justice and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2015
This bill rolls back a package of tough-on-youth-crime laws introduced in 2013 and 2014. It abolishes youth boot camps, ends the offence of breaching bail for children, restores a ban on naming children in the media, and reinstates the principle that detention or imprisonment should only be used as a last resort.