Committee Details

Committee’s report

The committee tabled its Report No. No. 4, 58th Parliament – Trusts Bill 2025 on 7 March 2025. The Bill passed with amendment on 1 May 2025. 

ABOUT THE BILL

On 18 February 2025, the Hon Deb Frecklington MP, Attorney-General and Minister for Justice and Minister for Integrity, introduced the Trusts Bill 2025 into the Queensland Parliament.  The Bill was referred to the Justice, Integrity and Community Safety Committee for detailed consideration.   

View: Explanatory speech  
View: Bill
View: Explanatory Notes   
View: Statement of compatibility    

The purpose of the Bill is to replace the Trusts Act 1973 (Act) with modernised and simplified legislation, streamlined with some new or substantially changed provisions to meet the needs of modern Queensland and remedy existing issues with the Act. 

From January 2012 to December 2013, the Queensland Law Reform Commission (QLRC) conducted a full, comprehensive and independent review of the Act considering equivalent provisions in other jurisdictions and undertook substantial consultation with a wide range of stakeholders. The Bill broadly reflects recommendations from the QLRC.

The objectives of the Bill are to:

• repeal provisions of the Act that are now obsolete or no longer appropriate in modern trusts legislation, or that confer powers that are no longer needed in light of the new provisions of the Bill

• streamline the legislation, meet modern needs and address existing gaps in the Act, and

• streamline the law with respect to deciding disputes in relation to the administration of trusts, especially for matters involving lower monetary values, including cy pres schemes.

NB: Cy pres in plain English means: ‘as nearly as possible’. Cy pres applications refer to situations where the purpose of a charitable trust is incapable of being carried out (for example, because it is in favour of a charity that no longer exists) and the trust property is to be applied to another charity which has a charitable purpose as near as possible to the original charitable purpose.

The Trusts Bill 2024 (2024 Bill) was referred to the former Housing, Big Build and Manufacturing Committee (HBBMC) which tabled its report on 2 August 2024, however the Bill lapsed before it was debated in the Parliament. The 2024 Bill largely mirrored the current Bill being considered by the committee with some key amendments. All documents related to the former committee’s inquiry are available here.

Further information

Further information including written briefings, correspondence, response to submissions, transcripts and answers to questions taken on notice are available under the Related Publications tab.

Call for submissions

Submissions closed on Tuesday, 25 February 2025. Submissions accepted by the committee can be accessed under the “View Submissions” tab above.

Timeline