Legislation
The Department and all employees are responsible for ensuring our work environment is free from discrimination and harassment and promotes equality of employment opportunity.
The Commonwealth and Queensland laws that make provision for equal employment opportunity, anti-discrimination and workplace and sexual harassment are listed below.
- Disability Discrimination Act 1992
- Racial Discrimination Act 1975
- Sex Discrimination Act 1984
- Age Discrimination Act 2004
- Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission Act 1986
These Acts are available from SCALEplus 
, the online legal information retrieval system of the Australian Attorney-General's Department.
- Anti-Discrimination Act 1991
- Equal Opportunity in Public Employment Act 1992
- Workplace Health and Safety Act 1995
- Industrial Relations Act 1999
- Crime and Misconduct Act 2001
These Acts are available from the Queensland Legislation website.
The Equal Opportunity in Public Employment (EOPE) Act 1992 promotes equality of employment opportunity in the public sector and states that decisions relating to appointment, transfer and development will be made on the basis of merit.
The EOPE Act requires the department to develop and implement a workforce diversity and equity management plan that includes initiatives to address the key employment challenges for people of equal employment opportunity (EEO) target groups.
EEO target groups are people affected by past or continuing disadvantage or discrimination in employment.
The EOPE Act defines the following people as members of EEO target groups:
- Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people
- People who have migrated to Australia and whose first language is a language other than English, and the children of those people
- People with a disability
- Women.
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