On 19 September 2024, the Respect at Work and Other Matters Amendment Act 2024 (Act) was introduced. The Act amends various Queensland legislation including the Anti-Discrimination Act 1991 (AD Act). The amendments to the AD Act will come into effect on 1 December 2024 and 1 July 2025.

As of 1 July 2025, most notably, the AD Act will introduce a new positive duty to take action to prevent contraventions of the AD Act and help promote substantive equality.

More specifically, there will be a positive duty to eliminate, as far as possible, discrimination, sexual harassment, harassment on the basis of sex and certain other objectionable conduct.

Some other important changes include:

1. replacing the definition of  ‘direct discrimination’ and ‘indirect discrimination’ which now arguably covers a wider range of actions, or proposed actions, that are classified as discriminatory, for example, ‘direct discrimination’ no longer requires a comparison of how a person with a certain attribute is treated compared to someone without that attribute;
2. prohibiting workplace harassment, or creating a hostile work environment, on the basis of sex;
3. broadening the prohibitions against engaging in any public act (which now specifically includes communications on social media) that would be hateful towards or vilify a person on the grounds of the person’s age, gender, identity, impairment, race, religion, sex, sex characteristics or sexual orientation; and
4. extending the time for making a complaint under the AD Act to 2 years.

There are many changes to the AD Act coming into effect that Queensland organisations should be aware of and implement across all internal policies and procedures. It is important to ensure your organisation is ready when these changes commence.

If you would like guidance on how to ensure your organisation is compliant, including updating all internal policies and procedures, please contact Mahoneys commercial Partner, Antony Harrison, or Associate Lawyer Sabrina Austin on (07) 3007 3777 or aharrison@mahoneys.com.au or saustin@mahoneys.com.au.

Written by Sabrina Austin

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