Queensland Council of Unions
OrganisationReferenced in 20 bills
Industrial Relations (Restoring Fairness) and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2015
This bill undoes industrial relations changes made by the previous government in 2012 and 2013 that reduced workplace conditions and union rights in Queensland's state system. It restores the independence of the Queensland Industrial Relations Commission, brings back union right of entry without notice, and removes restrictions on what can be included in workplace awards and agreements.
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.
Community Services Industry (Portable Long Service Leave) Bill 2019
This bill creates a portable long service leave scheme for Queensland's community services industry, covering workers in areas like disability support, family violence, homelessness, counselling and youth justice. It allows workers to accumulate long service leave credits as they move between employers in the sector, addressing the high job mobility caused by short-term funding contracts. The bill also fixes an anomaly where employees dismissed due to illness were denied 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 showing first responders experience mental health conditions at substantially higher rates than the general workforce.
Industrial Relations and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2022
This bill overhauls Queensland's industrial relations laws following a five-year review. It strengthens workplace sexual harassment protections, introduces minimum pay and conditions for independent courier drivers, updates parental leave to include stillbirth leave and flexible leave options, and requires gender pay gap disclosure during enterprise bargaining.
Work Health and Safety and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2017
This bill introduces a new criminal offence of industrial manslaughter in Queensland, with up to 20 years jail for employers or senior officers whose negligence causes a worker's death and up to $10 million for companies. It follows a government review prompted by the Dreamworld and Eagle Farm worker fatalities and also creates an independent WHS Prosecutor, expands workplace safety dispute powers to the Industrial Relations Commission, and brings back Workplace Health and Safety Officers.
Electrical Safety and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2024
This bill updates Queensland's electrical safety and workplace health and safety laws based on recommendations from five major reviews. It brings new technologies like e-scooters and battery storage systems under electrical safety regulation, strengthens industrial manslaughter laws to cover deaths of bystanders, makes it easier to prosecute serious safety breaches, and gives worker safety representatives new powers to document hazards.
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 — such as sleeping dragons, dragon's dens, monopoles, and tripods — during protests. It responds to incidents where activists used these devices to block transport infrastructure and businesses, endangering themselves, emergency workers, and the public.
Jobs Queensland Bill 2015
This bill creates Jobs Queensland, a new independent body that advises the state government on what skills Queensland will need, how to plan for future workforce needs, and how the apprenticeship and traineeship system should work. It is intended to give industry, unions, and regional Queensland a stronger voice in shaping training priorities.
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 staff the right to request conversion to permanent roles, and introduces positive performance management principles that must be applied before disciplinary action.
Integrity and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2023
This bill implements integrity reforms recommended by the Coaldrake Report and Yearbury Report. It overhauls the regulation of lobbyists to increase transparency, strengthens the independence of Queensland's five core integrity bodies by giving parliamentary committees a greater role in their funding and appointments, and extends the Ombudsman's jurisdiction to cover non-government organisations delivering public services on behalf of government.
Workers’ Compensation and Rehabilitation and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2015
This bill restores the right of injured Queensland workers to sue their employer for damages at common law, even for minor injuries, by scrapping the 5% impairment threshold introduced in 2013. It also treats 12 listed cancers as work-related injuries for long-serving firefighters and stops employers from checking a job applicant's workers' compensation claims history.
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.
Workers' Compensation and Rehabilitation (Coal Workers' Pneumoconiosis) and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2017
This bill improves workers' compensation for Queensland coal miners and others with dust-related lung diseases, sets up a committee so families of workers killed or seriously injured at work have a formal voice, and strengthens electrical licensing safety rules. It responds to the re-identification of coal workers' pneumoconiosis (CWP) in Queensland.
Workers’ Compensation and Rehabilitation (National Injury Insurance Scheme) Amendment Bill 2016
This bill creates a lifetime no-fault scheme for Queensland workers who suffer catastrophic injuries at work, such as spinal cord injury, major brain injury, severe burns or loss of limbs. It guarantees them ongoing treatment, care and support regardless of who caused the accident, starting from 1 July 2016. The bill also reforms self-insurance rules, blocks injury costs being shifted onto subcontractors, and protects compensation payments from dropping when wages fall.
Public Sector Bill 2022
This bill replaces the Public Service Act 2008 with a new Public Sector Act that modernises employment arrangements for all Queensland public sector employees. It implements recommendations from the Bridgman Review and the Coaldrake Report, extending employment protections across the entire public sector, creating new rights for temporary workers to convert to permanent roles, and requiring public sector entities to actively support the government's reframed relationship with Aboriginal peoples and Torres Strait Islander peoples.
Industrial Relations Bill 2016
This bill replaces Queensland's Industrial Relations Act 1999 with an entirely new framework governing work for the state's public service, local councils and Brisbane City Council. It sets new minimum employment conditions, makes collective bargaining the main way to negotiate pay and conditions, introduces paid domestic and family violence leave for the first time, and makes Easter Sunday a public holiday from 2017.
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.
Further Education and Training (Training Ombudsman) and Another Act Amendment Bill 2015
This bill creates an independent Training Ombudsman for Queensland to handle complaints about vocational education and training, apprenticeships, and traineeships. The Ombudsman is an independent statutory position appointed by the Governor in Council and backed by a public service office, with powers to investigate, refer, and report on complaints.