Working with Children Check Act 2000

This Act may be cited as the Working with Children Check Act 2000.

This Act commences on a day to be fixed by proclamation.

This Act binds all persons including the State and, as far as the legislative power of the Parliament permits, the Commonwealth and all the other States.

Subsection (1) does not make the State, the Commonwealth or another State liable for an offence.

The object of this Act is to promote and protect the rights, interests and wellbeing of children and young people in Queensland through a scheme requiring the screening of persons employed in particular employment or carrying on particular businesses.

This Act is to be administered under the following principles—

the welfare and best interests of a child are paramount;

every child is entitled to be cared for in a way that protects the child from harm and promotes the child’s wellbeing, which for an Aboriginal child or Torres Strait Islander child includes recognising the importance of connection with the child’s family, community, culture, traditions and language.

This Act applies to a person despite anything in the Criminal Law (Rehabilitation of Offenders) Act 1986.

The chief executive’s main functions under this Act are—

to administer the scheme under this Act that regulates—

persons employed, or proposed to be employed, in certain child-related employment; and

persons carrying on, or proposing to carry on, certain child-related businesses; and

to audit or monitor compliance with this Act; and

to establish a register of regulated persons who provide home-based care services to children.

The dictionary in schedule 7 defines particular words used in this Act.

For this Act, a person is employing another person if the first person has an agreement with the other person for the other person to carry out work.

It is immaterial for this section—

whether the agreement is written or unwritten; and

whether the work is carried out voluntarily or for financial reward; and

what a person’s motivation is for carrying out the work; and

the time for which the person is engaged to carry out the work; and

whether the agreement provides for the other person to carry out work on 1 occasion or on an ongoing basis, whether regularly or irregularly.

Also, for this section, the nature of the work is immaterial.

This section is subject to section 11.Examples of employment—

1 A person engaged by a shopping centre to appear as Santa.

2 A person orally agrees with the manager of a club to coach a children’s sporting team during a season.

3 The manager of a counselling organisation agrees with an adult student that the student attend the organisation’s office each day during a semester and carry out various duties.

4 A tour operator arranges with the parents of a family to provide a child accommodation service in their home to an international student.

This section applies if—

the first person mentioned in section 10 is an education provider; and

the other person mentioned in section 10 is a trainee student of the education provider; and

the work to be carried out is part of the course that the trainee student is undertaking with the education provider; and

the work is to be carried out for someone else.

For section 10, the person for whom the trainee student is to carry out work, or carries out work, is employing the trainee student.

Subsection (2) applies even if there is no express agreement between the person and the trainee student for the trainee student to carry out the work.

This section applies if a person is engaged, or proposes to be engaged, in regulated employment mentioned in schedule 1, section 14(1) or (2).

For this Act, and for no other purpose, the State is taken to be employing, or proposing to employ, the person in the regulated employment.

For this Act—

the chief executive (child safety) may carry out a function of the State relating to the person; and

if the person must disclose information to the person’s employer, or notify the employer about a matter—the person must disclose the information to, or notify, the chief executive (child safety).

Note—This declaration arises out of the volunteer or non-employee status of persons engaged in regulated employment mentioned in schedule 1, section 14(1) or (2).

This section applies if a person is employed at a State educational institution.

For this Act, the principal of the State educational institution and the chief executive of the department in which the Education (General Provisions) Act 2006 is administered are employing the person.