Queensland parliament updates: Labor warns of ‘Newman-era attack on workers’

Queensland Labor leader Steven Miles has accused Deputy Premier Jarrod Bleijie of reheating a “Newman-era attack on workers” through a bill introduced to parliament late last night.

Bleijie flagged the bill earlier in the day while tabling a government-commissioned review into the state’s workers’ compensation scheme and industrial relations laws, announcing the LNP would move to act on its recommendations immediately .

After coming to power with a limited industrial relations agenda, the government has put forward legislation which proposes to, among other things, hand Bleijie powers to terminate protected industrial action.

Amendments will also be made to open further avenues for an employer to apply to the industrial umpire to have such action suspended or terminated, “where public services are significantly impacted or the action is contrary to the public interest”.