Committee Details

COMMITTEE'S REPORT

The committee tabled its Report No. 17, 57th Parliament - Health and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2021 on 11 February 2022. The Government's Response to this report was tabled on 23 February 2022. The Bill was passed with amendment by the Queensland Parliament on 24 February 2022.

about the bill

On 1 December 2021, Hon Yvette D'Ath MP, Minister for Health and Ambulance Services introduced the Health and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2021 into the Queensland Parliament. The Bill was referred to the State Development and Regional Industries Committee for consideration.

The Bill amends the following acts to support the provision of health services in Queensland:

• Ambulance Service Act 1991 – to strengthen safeguards around the disclosure of confidential information and align them with the Hospital and Health Boards Act 2011, and to remove the requirement for the Queensland Ambulance Service Commissioner to be no older than 65 years of age
• Environmental Protection Act 1994 - to provide that development or use of premises that causes environmental nuisance, is not an offence under the Environmental Protection Act to the extent it has been assessed and is explicitly regulated by a requirement of an infrastructure designation by the Planning Minister under the Planning Act 2016
• Hospital and Health Boards Act - to enable allied health professionals to access The Viewer and allow certain designated persons and prescribed health professionals to disclose confidential information to a person performing functions under the Mental Health Act 2016
• Mental Health Act 2016 – to:
  • clarify how the Mental Health Court can proceed if there is a dispute of facts on which an expert has based their opinion
  • improve the process for approving electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) by providing additional protections and ensuring patients’ views, wishes and preferences are taken into account to the greatest extent practicable
  • ensure the provisions about apprehension and transfer of absent patients are effective and align with least restrictive practice
  • clarify the requirements for the interstate transfer of patients who have been placed under a forensic or treatment support order
  • promote a stronger rights-based approach for decisions about patient transfers between services
  • allow the Mental Health Review Tribunal (MHRT) to approve requests for international transfers of patients who have been placed under a forensic or treatment support order
  • strengthen the confidentiality provisions to ensure the obligations for all people performing functions under the Mental Health Act are clear and consistent
  • extend the duty of confidentiality to experts engaged to provide reports to the Mental Health Court or MHRT
  • improve support for victims of unlawful acts
  • make other minor amendments to improve the operation of the Mental Health Act.
• Public Health (Infection Control for Personal Appearance Services) Act 2003 - to improve the operation of the Act in relation to the restoration and renewal of business licences
• Radiation Safety Act 1999 - to remove the requirement to prescribe identity verification documents by regulation for particular applications, with identity requirements to be included in departmental policies, informed by the National Identity Proofing Guidelines
• Termination of Pregnancy Act 2018 and the Criminal Code Act 1899 - to allow students registered under the Health Practitioner Regulation National Law (National Law) who are undertaking a clinical placement with a health service to assist in a termination of pregnancy
• Transplantation and Anatomy Act 1979 to exclude human milk from the definition of tissue in the Act, to ensure sick and pre-term infants can be efficiently provided donated human milk to prevent or treat serious health conditions
• Corrective Services Act 2006 and Water Supply (Safety and Reliability) Act 2008 to make consequential amendments to remove references to the repealed Health Act 1937 and the Pest Management Act 2001 following the commencement of the Medicines and Poisons Act 2019. 

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