Local government in Queensland, Australia, includes the institutions and processes by which towns and districts can manage their own affairs to the extent permitted by the Local Government Act 1993–2007. Queensland is divided into 78 local government areas, which may be called Cities, Towns, Shires, or Regions.Local Government Act 1993 , s.34. (Reprint 11E, as in force at 22 November 2007.) Each area has a council that is responsible for providing a range of public services and utilities and derives its income from both rates and charges on resident ratepayers and grants and subsidies from the state and Commonwealth governments.
As bodies which obtain their legitimacy from an Act of the Queensland Parliament, local councils are subordinate rather than sovereign entities and can be created, amalgamated, abolished, or dismissed by the state at will. In modern practice, however, decisions on such matters are made in response to recommendations by independent Reform Commissions, such as the Electoral and Administrative Reform Commission (1990–1993) and the Local Government Reform Commission (2007). Recent reforms, which took effect on 15 March 2008, resulted in over 70% of Queensland's local government areas being amalgamated into larger entities and generated a considerable degree of controversy, even attracting national interest in the context of a federal election campaign.
As a result of Queensland and New South Wales local government amalgamations, Australia's three largest-by-population local government areas are all in Queensland: RankLocal government areaPopulation Estimated resident population, 30 June 2018.Population (2021)City of Brisbane1,242,8252City of Gold Coast625,0873City of Moreton Bay476,340
History and development
Early history The first example of local government in the Queensland area came before the separation of Queensland from New South Wales. The Municipalities Act 185822 Vict. No. 13 (NSW), assented 27 October 1858 allowed for the creation of a municipality upon the petition of not less than 50 householders within a defined area. If no counter-petition with more signatures was received, the governor was able to declare a municipality in the region. Two types of municipalities were possible under the act: boroughs, which had a minimum population of 1,000, a maximum area of and no two parts being more than apart; and municipal districts, with a minimum population of 500 and a maximum area of . Once a municipality had been proclaimed, ratepayers could elect a council to represent them.
The first to be declared was Brisbane, with a population of 5,000 and an area of . Its first attempt in January 1859 was unsuccessful due to a counter-petition, but its second attempt with 420 signatories was gazetted on 25 May 1859 and proclaimed by the Governor of New South Wales on 7 September 1859.Larcombe (1973), pp270, 274. On 16 November, a petition containing 91 signatures was received seeking to have Ipswich, which had 3,000 people, granted municipal town status. On 29 November, the letters patent authorised by Queen Victoria, which were to make Queensland a separate colony, were published in New South Wales, and the petition was forwarded to the new Queensland governor, Sir George Ferguson Bowen. On 10 December 1859, the same day that the letters patent were published in Queensland, the petition was regazetted. On 3 March 1860, the Town of Ipswich was proclaimed.
Following this, eight other councils obtained municipality status under the act: Toowoomba (19 November 1860), Rockhampton (13 December 1860), Maryborough (23 March 1861), Warwick (25 May 1861), Drayton (1862), Gladstone (20 February 1863), Bowen (7 August 1863) and Dalby (21 August 1863).
By 1879, almost all of Queensland was under some form of local administration, either as a municipality under the Local Government Act 1878 or as a division under the Divisional Boards Act 1879.
Municipal Institutions Act In September 1864, the first comprehensive Queensland local government legislation, the Municipal Institutions Act 1864, was enacted, repealing the previous Act.28 Vic No. 21 (Imp). Section 1 repealed the previous Act. The Act allowed municipalities to charge rates, borrow money, enact bylaws, control or regulate public infrastructure and utilities, and provide public amenities such as gardens and hospitals.
The system for creating new municipalities was redesigned. Firstly, a signed petition had to be presented to the Governor from a minimum of 100 householders to create a new district or divide an existing one, or a minimum of 50 householders to extend an existing district to cover a neighbouring rural area. Once this had been done, the Governor could proclaim the change, and residents could then elect a council to represent them. Any man over the age of 21 who was a tenant, occupier, landlord, or proprietor within the municipality could vote, and they were entitled to between one and three votes depending on the level of rates they paid. Only qualified voters could stand for council elections, conducted annually, with one-third of the councillors retiring at each election. Once the council was elected, they selected a mayor from among their number. For the first time, municipalities could be divided into wards upon their own request—from two wards for a population under 1,000 to four wards for a population over 5,000.Harris (1978), pp14-15.
During the 14 years that the Act was in force, the Drayton municipality was abolished in 1875, and nine new municipalities were created: Townsville (15 February 1866), Gayndah (28 November 1866), Clermont (21 January 1867), Roma (21 May 1867), Allora (21 July 1869), Mackay (22 September 1869), Copperfield (10 May 1872), Cooktown (3 April 1876) and Charters Towers (21 June 1877).
The dual system
The Queensland Government passed the Local Government Act 1878 in August of that year. According to the act, the function of municipal councils was to maintain "the good rule and government of the municipality" and to provide public services and amenities. Examples of such anticipated by the act included parks and reserves, libraries, cemeteries, water and sanitation services, roads, bridges, wharves, street lighting, public health, fire prevention, the regulation of building construction, and the regulation and issuing of a range of licences for uses of land. It made provision for the creation of additional municipalities to be known as cities, boroughs, or shires, either upon or without petition. Any man or woman over the age of 21 who was liable to be rated on any property in the district was eligible to vote in elections, which were to be held every February. In most other respects, the Local Government Act 1878 followed on from the 1864 act.
The act was modelled on the Victorian Local Government Act 1874 (38 Vict. No. 506 (Vic.)), but the legislation soon proved unsuitable to Queensland's requirements given its large, sparsely populated areas. The government's response was the Divisional Boards Act 1879, which intended to extend local government to those areas of Queensland which could not be included in municipalities. The act divided all lands in the colony not already included into municipalities into 74 divisions, each governed by a Board of between three and nine members. Elections were to be conducted by postal ballot.Harris (1978), p.17-18.
Twentieth century With the passing of the Local Authorities Act 1902, which repealed both previous acts and extended councils' authority over the areas they controlled, the municipalities became towns (unless they had city status), and the divisions became Shires on 31 March 1903. In 1915–1917 and again in 1949, significant changes were made to local government in south-eastern Queensland and far northern Queensland.
The Local Authorities Act Amendment Act 1920 was passed in late 1920. It introduced adult franchise into local government elections, bringing them into line with the state and federal parliament (previously, the voters were restricted to ratepayers). From July 1921, local councils were elected every three years instead of annually. Mayors and shire chairmen were elected directly by the electorate and did not represent any ward within the local government area; previously, the council members elected the mayor/chairman from among themselves. Minimum standards of competency were required for town/shire clerks.
By the time the Local Government Act 1936 came into effect, although the different categories of local government areas still existed, they were essentially a naming convention and had no practical meaning under the act. A city had to be proclaimed by the governor following certain criteria being met.
In 1925, a number of local governments in Brisbane were amalgamated into the City of Brisbane, covering what was then the entire metropolitan area. Its council, Brisbane City Council, effectively became a "super-council" with some powers normally reserved for the state. It has its own act of Parliament, the City of Brisbane Act 1924, and, as at 2021, a population of 1,242,825. Due to population growth and suburban spread, however, almost half of metropolitan Brisbane's population actually lives in neighbouring areas such as Ipswich, Logan, Moreton Bay, and Redland, which are all managed under the Local Government Act.
In 1989, the Electoral and Administrative Review Commission was set up to investigate and report on a range of reforms to Queensland public administration, and one area of its purview was the Local Government Act 1936 and local council boundaries. As a result of its recommendations, the Goss Labor government then in charge amalgamated several councils, and a new Local Government Act 1993 was introduced.
Indigenous councils In the mid-1980s, with the passage of the Community Services (Torres Strait) Act 1984 and Community Services (Aborigines) Act 1984, many former Aboriginal reserves (created under the Aboriginals Protection and Restriction of the Sale of Opium Act 1897 and its successors) and missions (particularly in the Cape York region) and several Torres Strait islands were granted by way of a Deed of Grant in Trust to the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island communities. Formally recognised management bodies known as Indigenous community councils (or DOGIT councils) were set up to administer the land covered in the deed on behalf of the community. These bodies had quite different responsibilities to traditional local governments due to the nature of land ownership involved and the different relationships of the council to the community. In 2005–2007, as part of the Queensland Government's response to the Cape York Justice Study undertaken by Justice Fitzgerald QC in November 2001, these bodies became "Aboriginal Shire Councils" and "Island Councils" and obtained additional powers associated with local governments. A considerable number of them were amalgamated in 2008 into either the Torres Strait Island Region or the Northern Peninsula Area Region, which are Local Government Act bodies with special features, with lower-order community councils once again managing individual deeds and grants.
Twenty-first century
2008 local government amalgamations The Local Government Reform Commission was an independent, purpose-specific authority established by the Beattie Labor Queensland Government on 1 May 2007 to recommend the most appropriate future structure and boundaries for local government in Queensland. This was in part due to the number of financially weak councils with small populations in rural areas, dating from an earlier time when industry and population had justified their creation.
Every local government was reviewed, except Brisbane City Council, already having the largest population of any local government area in Australia.
Background