True

COMMITTEE’S REPORT

The committee tabled its Report No.7, 58th Parliament – Crime and Corruption (Restoring Reporting Powers) Amendment Bill 2025 on 11 April 2025. The Bill was passed with amendment, by the Queensland Parliament on Wednesday, 30 April 2025. 

About the BILL 

On 20 February 2025 the Hon Deborah Frecklington MP, Attorney-General and Minister for Justice and Minister for Integrity, introduced the Crime and Corruption (Restoring Reporting Powers) Amendment 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 objectives of the Bill are to:

• restore the power to report publicly about corruption investigations, as it was considered to exist before the High Court decision, and to ensure that the Crime and Corruption Commission (CCC) may also make public statements about these matters;
• safeguard against the release of information to the public about corruption matters in circumstances where the risks or harms outweigh any benefits to be derived from releasing the information; and
• ensure that any residual legal risk that might be attributable to the CCC and its officers in respect of the preparation and publication of past reports and statements is removed.

The Bill is designed to establish a framework for reporting and making public statements that provides clear guidance to the CCC and the public about the factors which should influence when public reporting about corruption matters will be appropriate. To this end, the Bill’s reporting and public statement powers are subject to a new safeguard in the form of a set of criteria which the CCC must consider before releasing information in either a report or public statement.

The Bill includes other unrelated miscellaneous amendments to help improve the CCC’s efficiency.

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, 11 March 2025. Submissions accepted by the committee can be accessed under the “View Submissions” tab above.

Timeline