Category Archives: Queensland

Queensland to hold inquiry into health risks of e-cigarettes amid concerns some contain toxic chemicals

Posted on by

More knowledge needed about whether vaping is a ‘stepping stone’ to smoking and to raise awareness of harmful effects among youth, premier says

The Queensland parliament will hold an inquiry into the health risks, use and prevalence of e-cigarettes, amid concerns that some vaping products marketed as “nicotine free” actually contain the addictive chemical.

Queensland laws allow the sale of nicotine-free vaping devices in tobacco shops. E-cigarettes containing nicotine are only available with a prescription.

Sign up for a weekly email featuring our best reads

Continue reading...

Queensland floods: police say Burketown ‘not safe’ as dozens airlifted out

Posted on by

Residents in state’s rural west are bracing for the peak of record flooding on Sunday

Residents in Queensland’s rural west are bracing for the peak of record flooding on Sunday as authorities warn any remaining residents, particularly the elderly and children, to leave immediately.

Police concerns centred on the outback town of Burketown, in the state’s north-west, where authorities were on Saturday “strongly urging all remaining residents to leave … as soon as possible”.

Continue reading...

Record-breaking floods in north-west Queensland cause partial evacuation of outback town

Posted on by

Gulf of Carpentaria town’s elderly residents airlifted and supplies flown to nearby Indigenous community as rivers reach peak levels

Vulnerable people will be evacuated from an outback town by air amid widespread record-breaking floods across Queensland’s vast north-west.

Small helicopters and planes will be used to airlift elderly people from Burketown near the Gulf of Carpentaria to Mount Isa, about 400km to the south, on Friday.

Sign up for Guardian Australia’s free morning and afternoon email newsletters for your daily news roundup

Continue reading...

Queensland’s north hit by heavy rain and floods as tropical storm heads south

Posted on by

Widespread rainfall expected in state’s south-east this weekend but nowhere near the 500mm recorded in the north-west

The tropical storm that has caused widespread flooding across far north Queensland is heading south, but is expected to ease before it hits Brisbane, according to the Bureau of Meteorology.

Parts of Queensland’s north-west were hit with more than 500mm of rain in the 48 hours to Thursday morning, the BoM information specialist Danny Teece-Johnson said.

Sign up for Guardian Australia’s free morning and afternoon email newsletters for your daily news roundup

Continue reading...

Brisbane watch house officer tells inquest she did not check if Aunty Sherry Tilberoo was breathing

Posted on by

Debra Haigh tells hearing she now understands she should have stood in front of cell for longer and used a torch to look for movement

A Brisbane watch house officer who was suspended after the death of First Nations woman Shiralee Tilberoo has admitted during an inquest that she did not check whether she was breathing or shine a torch into the darkened cell on nine occasions.

The Birri Gubba woman – also known as Aunty Sherry – died of a brain aneurysm in Brisbane City watch house in the early hours of the morning on 10 September 2020.

Sign up for Guardian Australia’s free morning and afternoon email newsletters for your daily news roundup

Continue reading...

Queensland to spend $5bn on 1,100km CopperString power line to unlock renewables potential

Posted on by

‘Eureka moment’ project will provide future energy certainty and trigger new minerals processing, Palaszczuk government says

The Queensland government has said it will take control of a $5bn proposal to build a 1,100km power line connecting Mount Isa to the national grid, which it says will “unlock” development of new-economy mineral deposits in the state’s north west.

The project, known as CopperString 2.0, has long been touted as necessary to provide future energy certainty to Queensland’s north-west minerals province, where miners are considering the potential to extract large amounts of copper, cobalt, vanadium, lead, zinc and phosphate.

Sign up for Guardian Australia’s free morning and afternoon email newsletters for your daily news roundup

Continue reading...

‘Like a little dragon’: new gecko species discovered on rugged Queensland island

Posted on by

The carnivorous Phyllurus fimbriatus is only found in the wettest, rockiest pockets of Scawfell Island

A new species of gecko that “looks like a little dragon”, with a beaky face and spiny leaf-shaped tail, has been discovered on an uninhabited Queensland island.

The new lizard was found on Scawfell Island, a rugged island about 50km offshore from the north Queensland city of Mackay.

Continue reading...

‘Public anxiety’ no justification to override Human Rights Act on youth crime laws, Queensland MPs told

Posted on by

Human rights commissioner Scott McDougall warns against making breach of bail an offence for children at tense parliamentary committee hearing

Queensland’s human rights commissioner has told a parliamentary committee that “public anxiety” is no justification for overriding the state’s Human Rights Act to make breach of bail an offence for children, warning that doing so could set a precedent.

In a tense back-and-forth during a hearing into the proposed youth crime laws, Scott McDougall said he was deeply concerned about the impact that the suspension of the act could have.

Sign up for Guardian Australia’s free morning and afternoon email newsletters for your daily news roundup

Continue reading...

Queensland human rights commissioner says police must watch for vigilante activity

Posted on by

Police have repeatedly warned against vigilantism but there are growing concerns that recent heightened debate might increase risk

The Queensland human rights commissioner, Scott McDougall, says police must closely monitor vigilante activity, amid concern about the role of anti-crime Facebook groups where residents have threatened children or called for violent responses to youth crime.

Debate about youth crime in Queensland last week prompted the state government to override its Human Rights Act to introduce new laws, which will result in children being charged with criminal offences for breaching bail conditions. Experts say there is no evidence to support such a move.

Sign up for Guardian Australia’s free morning and afternoon email newsletters for your daily news roundup

Continue reading...

Queensland becomes first Australian state to introduce pill testing in move away from ‘1950s drug policy’

Posted on by

Health minister Yvette D’Ath says state will introduce pill testing at mobile and fixed sites following success of trials in Canberra

Queensland will become the first Australian state to roll out pill-testing sites in an attempt to curb the harmful effects of illicit drugs.

The move will shift the country more in line with global standards on harm minimisation, one advocate says.

Sign up for Guardian Australia’s free morning and afternoon email newsletters for your daily news roundup

Continue reading...

Powerpoint and politics: inside Queensland Labor’s shock decision to lock up children for breaching bail

Posted on by

Government claims a bipartisan approach to respond to community concerns, but experts warn of increased pressure on the buckling youth detention system

At a community crime forum in Toowoomba last week, the Queensland police minister, Mark Ryan, announced the government’s new youth bail plan – an “intensive supervision” program involving police doing home checks and patrols.

It didn’t go down well. Ryan was hounded by attendees and mocked for factual comments that most people on bail do not reoffend.

Sign up for Guardian Australia’s free morning and afternoon email newsletters for your daily news roundup

Continue reading...

‘Recipe for disaster’: Queensland bail law that overrides children’s human rights won’t work, experts say

Posted on by

Legal groups also criticise the push to override the state’s Human Rights Act to create the offence

Experts say there is zero evidence to support Annastacia Palaszczuk’s controversial decision to pursue criminal charges against Queensland children who breach bail.

Human rights organisations have also delivered scathing criticisms of the government’s bid to override the state’s Human Rights Act to legislate the offence for children, warning that it likely won’t reduce offending.

Sign up for Guardian Australia’s free morning and afternoon email newsletters for your daily news roundup

Continue reading...

Media companies lose bid to name high-profile man charged with Queensland rape

Posted on by

Toowoomba magistrate rules media will have to adhere to Queensland laws that prevent naming him before he’s committed to stand trial

A media application seeking to name a high-profile man charged with raping a young woman in Toowoomba in 2021 has been adjourned by a magistrate who deemed the bid “premature”.

Queensland media law prevents identifying people accused of serious sex offences until they are committed to stand trial, legislation that magistrate Kay Philipson on Wednesday described as very specific.

Continue reading...

Australia at risk of electricity supply shortages as renewable projects lag behind coal plant closures

Posted on by

Successive La Niñas have eased demand but with many renewable and storage projects now delayed, the energy market operator has revised its projections

Australia’s main electricity grid will probably avoid major supply shortages next summer, but risks escalate in later years as ageing coal plants exit potentially faster than new renewables and storage projects come on line.

The projections are contained in the Australian Energy Market Operator’s (Aemo) updated Electricity Statement of Opportunities (Esoo) report, released on Tuesday.

Sign up for Guardian Australia’s free morning and afternoon email newsletters for your daily news roundup

Continue reading...

Australia news live: landmark report confirms wage theft by universities; treasurer calls for changes to super laws

Posted on by

Staff underpaid more than $80m in past three years. Follow the day’s news live

Fresh push to ban ‘asbestos of the 2020s’

There’s a fresh push to ban engineered stone commonly used in kitchen benchtops and linked to an incurable lung disease likened to asbestosis, AAP reports.

Instead of planning a family, we’re planning my funeral. I used to install kitchen benches. People liked engineered stone because it was cheap. But the dust got into my lungs causing deadly, incurable silicosis.

That’s too high a price for anyone to pay. Nothing will save my life but if you join the campaign to stop the importation and manufacture of engineered stone, you can help save someone else’s. Please.

Australian workers like Kyle are dying because of engineered stone.

The companies flooding our markets with this cheap and nasty material know that, but to them profits are more important than people’s lives.

It is incredibly distressing … when we hear about these horrific murders and we have to do more to prevent [them from] happening.

I often say we have to start responding to the red flags before more blue police tape surrounds the family home.

Continue reading...

Australia news live: back safeguard mechanism to ‘put climate wars behind us’, Labor urges Coalition and Greens – as it happened

Posted on by

This blog is now closed

‘The onus is on Labor’ to explain why it needs more coal and gas: Bandt

There’s some discussion about possible alternatives – one suggestion is to pause new developments on gas and coal developments while reforms to the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 have been hammered out.

We are up for good-faith discussions and proposals like that are coming from people like the Climate Council, from The Australia Institute. I’ve seen the Australia Conservation Foundation out saying there are serious problems with the government’s proposal.

You can’t put the fire out while pouring petrol on it.

I don’t think the penny has quite dropped with the government how much things are have moved on. 66% of people between 18 and 34 back our position – don’t want new coal and gas mines opened. 57% of the general population. Things have moved on.

I know Labor talks a lot about history, but the students who are marching in the streets at the moment, behind banners saying, “No new coal and gas” were in primary school in 2009. They do not want it, no one can understand why we are coming up to the year anniversary of the floods in Lismore, people cannot understand why Labor says they want to open up new projects.

Why does Labor want to go to the wall to open new coal and gas projects? These are huge climate bombs. They’ve got a very – I think it is an untenable task...

Continue reading...

‘They bleed you dry’: the recruitment scammers preying on Australian job seekers

Posted on by

As cybercriminals increasingly target the job market, antipoverty advocates say punitive welfare rules leave job seekers particularly vulnerable

“I can’t stop kicking myself,” Rose* says.

The 51-year-old has just lost $10,000 to scammers – a life-changing amount for the mother of three.

Sign up for a weekly email featuring our best reads

Continue reading...

Two men trapped underground at outback Queensland mine site found dead

Posted on by

A search located the bodies of miners Dylan Langridge and Trevor Davis who went missing on Wednesday after plunging into a void in the remote Dugald River zinc mine near Cloncurry

The two men trapped 125 metres underground at a north-west Queensland mine have been found dead.

Dylan Langridge and Trevor Davis went missing on Wednesday in the remote Dugald River zinc mine, near Cloncurry after their ute fell into a stope, a large void that contains the ore being mined, and became trapped at a depth of about 125 metres underground.

Sign up for Guardian Australia’s free morning and afternoon email newsletters for your daily news roundup

Continue reading...

Bodies of missing men found – as it happened

Posted on by

This blog is now closed. Follow our next Australia news live blog here when it launches

Where the parties stand

So the Greens are pushing hard against new coal and gas but have not indicated they are willing to kill off the legislation.

We’re willing to negotiate on everything that we consider will be in keeping with our government’s approach and our election mandate. Nothing more, nothing less. We went to the people seeking a mandate. That’s what we will implement.

Continue reading...

Two miners missing 125m underground after ‘collapse’ at Queensland mine

Posted on by

Search under way for pair who fell into a large cavern – or stope – at the zinc mine in Dugald River near Mount Isa

A search and rescue effort has been launched for two miners missing after their ute plunged into a deep hole after a “ground collapse” in the remote Dugald River zinc mine, near Mount Isa in north-west Queensland.

The men’s ute fell into a stope – a large void that contains the ore being mined – and are now missing at a depth of about 125 metres underground.

Continue reading...