Conservation

This bill reinstates and strengthens Queensland's vegetation clearing laws, delivering on the government's election commitment to end broadscale tree clearing. It removes the ability to clear remnant vegetation for agriculture, extends regrowth protections to freehold and indigenous land, expands watercourse protections to all Great Barrier Reef catchments, and significantly increases penalties for unlawful clearing.

This Greens private member's bill would have banned all coal mining in Queensland's Galilee Basin, including terminating Adani's existing mining leases for the Carmichael mine without compensation. It was based on the 2018 IPCC Special Report finding that coal must be almost entirely phased out of global electricity by 2050 to limit warming to 1.5 degrees. The bill lapsed and did not become law.

This bill protects the Great Barrier Reef by tightly controlling port development along the Queensland coast. It confines new port facilities and capital dredging to four priority ports (Abbot Point, Gladstone, Hay Point/Mackay and Townsville) and bans sea dumping of port dredge spoil in the World Heritage Area. Each priority port must have a long-term master plan and a port overlay that sets consistent rules across local planning schemes.

This bill enables the joint management of national parks and conservation parks on Moreton Island (Mulgumpin) by the Quandamooka People and the Queensland Government. It follows a 2019 Federal Court native title determination and extends the same joint management model already used on North Stradbroke Island.

This bill reverses 2013 changes that had extended sand mining on North Stradbroke Island (Minjerribah) out to 2035, restoring the original plan to end mining substantially by 2019. It also creates a new power for former mine operators across Queensland to re-enter land to finish rehabilitation after their mining leases expire.

This bill replaces the 2002 Stock Route Management Act with a new framework for managing Queensland's 72,000km stock route network that runs through 44 local government areas. It puts local councils firmly in charge as day-to-day managers of the network, lets them keep all fees and fines they collect, and brings stock travel, grazing and pasture harvesting under a single Act instead of four.

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.

This bill strengthens protections for the Great Barrier Reef by toughening regulations on agricultural and industrial activities that contribute to poor water quality. It expands mandatory farming standards across all Reef catchments and introduces a national approach to classifying threatened species in Queensland.

This bill would have ended sand mining on North Stradbroke Island (Minjerribah) by the end of 2024, with land rehabilitation allowed to continue until the end of 2029. It amended the North Stradbroke Island Protection and Sustainability Act 2011 to shrink where mining could occur and to block any lease renewals beyond 2029. The bill was discharged and did not become law.

This bill rolls back several 2013 changes to Queensland's nature conservation laws to strengthen protection of national parks. It restores 'conservation of nature' as the sole purpose of the Nature Conservation Act 1992, brings back three distinct classes of protected area with their own management rules, and restores the requirement for public consultation before management plans are changed.

This bill strengthens protections for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander traditional knowledge used in biodiscovery — the process of collecting native biological materials for scientific analysis and commercial purposes like pharmaceuticals and bioplastics. It requires researchers and companies to obtain consent and negotiate benefit sharing with First Nations custodians before using their knowledge, aligning Queensland with the international Nagoya Protocol.

This bill proposed two changes to Queensland's Vegetation Management Act 1999. It would have required the government to issue a formal written notice when it rejected a vegetation clearing application, giving applicants the right to seek an internal review. It also would have allowed graziers to apply to clear land to grow feed for livestock by removing grazing from the list of excluded activities. The bill was introduced by Shane Knuth MP and lapsed at the end of the 55th Parliament, so it did not become law.

This bill would have created a new Queensland Crocodile Authority based in Cairns with powers to kill or relocate crocodiles that threaten people, and to authorise crocodile farming and egg harvesting as a new industry. Introduced by KAP MP Shane Knuth as a private member's bill in response to crocodile attacks in North Queensland, it lapsed and did not become law.

This bill extends beekeeping access on specified national parks for 20 years until 2044, creates new offences for impersonating rangers and forest officers across Queensland's parks and forests, modernises enforcement powers for conservation officers, and updates governance arrangements for the Wet Tropics World Heritage Area.

This bill makes a broad range of changes across agriculture, biosecurity, animal welfare, forestry, racing and nature conservation law. Its most prominent measures double penalties for trespassing on farming land, strengthen biosecurity obligations for anyone entering places where biosecurity matter is present, clarify that leaving animals in hot vehicles is an offence, and expand access to farm debt mediation.

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.

This bill establishes the Queensland Veterans' Council as a new statutory body to manage Anzac Square as the state's war memorial, administer the Anzac Day Trust Fund that supports ex-service personnel and their families, and advise the Queensland Government on veterans' matters. It replaces the existing Anzac Day Trust and the informal Queensland Veterans' Advisory Council with a single, more accountable body.

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.

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.

This bill overhauls Queensland's environmental regulation across multiple domains. It introduces ERA codes as a simpler way to regulate lower-risk environmental activities, creates a single tourism permission for operators working across parks and forests, strengthens enforcement powers for environmental and koala habitat offences, and improves protections for bore owners affected by resource operations.

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.

This bill reinstates stronger vegetation clearing laws to slow land clearing and protect the Great Barrier Reef. It re-regulates high-value regrowth on freehold and indigenous land, stops new approvals for clearing native vegetation for high-value agriculture, and brings back riverine protection permits for destroying vegetation in waterways. Key clearing rules apply retrospectively from 17 March 2016 to prevent a rush of pre-emptive clearing.

This bill makes sweeping changes across agriculture, fisheries, biosecurity and animal management in Queensland. It bans dangerous dog breeds and introduces statewide dog control laws with tough new penalties, establishes mandatory onboard monitoring for commercial fishing vessels to protect the Great Barrier Reef, strengthens biosecurity emergency response powers, and modernises several other agricultural regulatory frameworks.

This bill creates a new type of protected area called a 'special wildlife reserve' that lets private landholders permanently protect their land with the same legal standing as a national park. It also strengthens Great Barrier Reef regulation and streamlines how conservation agreements are handled when land tenure changes.

This bill updates 10 Queensland agriculture laws with mostly technical changes — clearing the way for drone-based crop spraying, tightening controls on feeding animal products to livestock, speeding up exotic disease responses, simplifying pet microchip rules, and realigning company director liability with national principles. It also stops the automatic repeal of rules that manage the state's 38 remaining forest reserves, keeping them in place until those lands can be transferred to new tenures.

This bill creates a new kind of protected area in Queensland called a 'special wildlife reserve', letting private landholders lock in permanent, national-park-level protection over land of outstanding conservation value while keeping it in private ownership. It also makes sure existing conservation agreements on leasehold land are not lost when the lease is renewed, converted or transferred, and closes a small regulatory gap for activities straddling Queensland and Commonwealth waters in the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park.

This bill puts the legal framework in place for government electronic systems to automatically issue low-risk environmental and nature conservation permits. It also retrospectively confirms that permits issued automatically since 2017 are legally valid, giving certainty to the thousands of permit holders who have relied on them.

This bill updates 68 other Queensland laws so they work with the new Planning Act 2016 and Planning and Environment Court Act 2016, which together replace the Sustainable Planning Act 2009. It mostly changes terminology and cross-references, removes duplicated or outdated planning steps, and sets transitional rules so any application already lodged is finished under the old system.

This bill modernises Queensland's environmental protection laws by reforming the environmental impact statement process, strengthening enforcement powers against repeat offenders, creating temporary authorities for emergencies, and banning mining in the Wet Tropics World Heritage Area. It also updates contaminated land management, waste regulation, and mine rehabilitation frameworks.

This bill restructures the GasFields Commission Queensland to clearly separate its strategic board from its day-to-day management, and to allow a part-time chairperson. It also makes it easier for biodiscovery businesses to on-license the use of native biological material, and fixes a technical gap in how port planning overlays apply to development.

This bill undoes several water law changes that the previous government passed in 2014 but which had not yet taken effect. It puts ecologically sustainable development principles back into the purpose of the Water Act 2000, removes 'water development options' that would have given large infrastructure proponents an early exclusive claim over water, and removes the ability to declare 'designated watercourses' where a water licence would not be needed. It also fixes a 2005 technical mistake in setting up the Lower Herbert Water Management Authority and confirms that existing river improvement trusts continue to operate.

This bill is an omnibus package that makes changes across nine Queensland laws in the natural resources and mines portfolio. It strengthens explosives security, modernises gas safety, protects two Cape York properties from mining, gives Indigenous communities more flexibility over land and social housing, and updates state land compliance powers and property titling.