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Queensland's new child safeguarding law, the Child Safe Organisations Act 2024 came inro effect on 1 October 2025. It comprises two parts: Child Safe Standards and the Reportable Conduct Scheme.
The Reportable Conduct Scheme has been brought forward and will now commence for all organisations on 1 July 2026. Find out if you need to comply.
The Reportable Conduct Scheme
The Reportable Conduct Scheme improves the way organisations manage complaints about inappropriate behaviour towards children. It requires organisations to take all concerns seriously and respond appropriately.
The scheme requires organisations to complete an investigation in response to concerns about an employee’s behaviour towards children and record the outcomes in a way that can be shared with other organisations to prevent harm to children. This plays a critical role in identifying behaviour that is concerning but doesn’t reach the threshold for a police response.
The scheme is designed to connect information across organisations, regulators and sectors to identify people who present a risk to the safety of children.
What is reportable conduct?
Reportable conduct includes:
- a child sexual offence
- sexual misconduct committed in relation to, or in the presence of a child
- ill-treatment of a child
- significant neglect of a child
- physical violence committed in relation to, or in the presence of a child, or
- behaviour that causes significant emotional or psychological harm to a child.
Reportable conduct may be one act or a series of acts or incidents. It does not need to have occurred in the course of the worker’s employment, for example, it may occur while the worker is off duty or out of hours.
| Conduct type | What does this mean? |
|---|---|
| A child sexual offence | This includes child sexual abuse in all its forms, including grooming and child sexual exploitation material. |
| Sexual misconduct committed in relation to, or in the presence of, a child | Conduct that is sexual in nature, including:
|
| Ill-treatment of a child | Cruel, humiliating or inhuman conduct, including verbal abuse, making excessive or degrading demands or using inappropriate forms of behaviour management. |
| Significant neglect of a child | Deliberate or reckless failure to meet the basic needs of the child. It can be a single serious failure to meet a child’s basic needs, or from an ongoing pattern of repeated failure to meet a child’s needs. |
| Physical violence committed in relation to, or in the presence of, a child | Physical harm or force that causes or risks injury. This includes physical intimidation where a child or young person is scared that they will be harmed. A reckless application of physical force means the worker or volunteer may have not intended to use physical force but was reckless about the impact their actions could have on a child. |
| Behaviour that causes significant emotional or psychological harm to a child | Conduct that has serious, ongoing effects on a child’s emotional wellbeing and/or development. This includes harm that is serious in nature (not trivial) and is observed or professionally assessed through changes in behaviour distress, anxiety, withdrawal or a diagnoses. |
Who needs to comply?
Organisations required to comply with the Reportable Conduct Scheme include:
- be listed in the Act (Schedule 2 or prescribed by regulation), and
- care for, supervise or exercise authority over children.
Read more on our Who needs to comply and when webpage.
Who can an allegation be made about?
A concern can be raised about any worker of an organisation that is required to comply with the Reportable Conduct Scheme.
A worker of a reporting entity is a person who performs work of any kind for the organisation, including employees in all capacities, volunteers, contractors, subcontractors, consultants, labour-hire workers, trainees and work experience employees, and religious leaders.
What are organisations required to do?
Organisations need to have systems in place:
- to prevent reportable conduct by workers in the workplace, enacted through the Child Safe Standards
- that enable anyone to report concerns of reportable conduct to the head of the organisation and to us
- to investigate reportable conduct.
The head of the organisation is typically the chief executive officer or equivalent position. The head of the organisation can delegate their functions to an appropriately qualified person. If your organisation doesn’t have a chief executive officer, we will approve the person who needs to lead these activities.
If your organisation receives a report about reportable conduct, the head of your organisation is required to:
- notify us of the report within three business days
- provide us with an interim report within 30 business days
- provide us with a final report including the investigation findings as soon as practicable.
Your organisations may have existing requirements to report to other regulators, police or another body. The Reportable Conduct Scheme does not change these existing reporting requirements.
Failure to report can result in the head of an organisation receiving a financial penalty of $16,690 (100 penalty units) and details can be recorded on a public register.
Reportable Conduct must be reported to us from 1 July 2026. We will provide reporting instructions closer to this date.
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Managing a report
You must act promptly when you receive a concern about reportable conduct.
For information on the process to follow to manage a report, visit our Managing a report webpage.
Our role
We are the independent regulator responsible for administering, monitoring and enforcing the Reportable Conduct Scheme across Queensland, when it comes into effect. Our priority in the first instance is on supporting organisations to meet their obligations.
Our oversight of investigations
We ensure organisations investigate reportable conduct concerns properly.
We review an organisation’s interim and final reports to ensure organisations:
- followed lawful, fair and child-safe investigation processes
- ensured the best interests of the child at the centre of decision-making
- take appropriate and timely steps to minimise ongoing risk to children.
Our role is to support organisations through this process and to provide support where required.
We may intervene if we are concerned about capacity, timeliness, quality or independence, or if there are serious child safety concerns requiring immediate action.
We do not approve, endorse or recommend any independent investigators. If you choose to use an independent investigator, you are responsible for checking that they have the appropriate experience.
Our functions and powers under the law are further detailed in our Regulatory Approach.
Conducting investigations
We can conduct our own investigation where:
- an organisation is reasonably unable to investigate
- an inadequate investigation has been conducted by an organisation
- it is in the public interest to investigate the allegation about a worker or the allegation relates to the head of an organisation.
Our legislative powers
We have powers to:
- require organisations to produce documents and records relevant to reportable conduct matters
- request a sector regulator to investigate a reportable conduct concern for a worker of a reporting entity
- monitor an investigation conducted by an organisation, such as by requesting information or observing interviews conducted
- compel the information needed to assess compliance with the Reportable Conduct Scheme.
Read more in our Regulatory Approach.
Information sharing and exchange
Information sharing is a primary function of the Child Safe Organisations system. It allows us to identify and address patterns of behaviour that may not be apparent from an isolated incident. It is critical to connecting intelligence gathered across organisations to identify patterns of behaviour that, together, can proactively identify risks to children.
Where appropriate and necessary, we share the outcomes of investigations with the Queensland Police Service, Blue Card Services and other regulators.
When does the Reportable Conduct Scheme commence?
The Reportable Conduct Scheme comes into effect from 1 July 2026 for all sectors. For more information, visit our Who needs to comply and when webpage.
We will be publishing more information soon to help you implement the Reportable Conduct Scheme and to learn how to complete an investigation.
In the meantime, you may find information from other jurisdictions helpful.
New South Wales – Reportable Conduct Scheme
Victoria – Reportable Conduct Scheme
ACT – Reportable Conduct Scheme
Western Australia - Ombudsman Western Australia
Last updated
10 December 2025
