Queensland politics as it happened: Parliament on Wednesday, March 25

With parliament moving onto government business now, set to run out to 9.30pm after the late Wednesday start, we’ll wrap up our blog coverage of the opening events there.

Here’s the key takeaways:

• Premier David Crisafulli has suggested the country needs to be “brave” and pursue new oil refineries to reduce reliance on imports while confirming the state’s representative on the national fuel supply taskforce, Cross Border Commissioner Bob Gee, has held his first meeting with stakeholders.
• Labor has used question time to push the government on why it “failed” to protect an 18-year-old who died in state care after being allowed to live with a man in his 40s who “used her as a sexual object”.

Parliament, and this blog, will be back from tomorrow morning.

Question time has wrapped up now, with Crisafulli also fielding a question on the issue of fuel prices from Katter’s Australian Party leader Robbie Katter.

Katter pointed to LNP policy from back in 2015 for a national ethanol mandate requiring fuel suppliers to blend the product into unleaded petrol or diesel.

Currently, only NSW and Queensland – home to the country’s largest ethanol suppliers – require this to occur.

Crisafulli largely brushed off the question, saying “we should look at all opportunities to make sure that energy in this state is plentiful, that energy in this nation is plentiful”.

“The country that we all grew up in is one that we should return to where we are prepared to drill [for oil], where we are prepared to refine, where we are prepared to store and we are prepared to look after our sovereignty in this nation”.

The premier also hit out at the Labor opposition about whether they wanted to keep Greens MP Michael Berkman happy or be “prepared to invest in opportunities and remove planning frameworks so that people can get on and do things like refine again” and store more fuel.

After a very Olympic-heavy remainder of ministerial statements, piggybacking off the announcements of Deputy Premier Jarrod Bleijie today, we’re into question time.

Labor’s focus today, across several questions, has been about the case of Hayley Malcolm – who had been allowed to live in state care with a man in his 40s who “used her as a sexual object” before her death in December just weeks after her 18th birthday.

Opposition Leader Steven Miles asked Child Safety Minister Amanda Camm why the government “failed to protect” her and the unborn child she was carrying at her death.

Camm said legislation prevented her from speaking about individual cases.

“What I would say more broadly about the child safety system, and it is on the record, and it’s on the record by the … Commission of Inquiry on behalf of the government, is that it is a broken system that we inherited by those opposite after a 10-year decade of decline and a revolving door of child safety ministers,” Camm said.

Across additional questions to Police Minister Dan Purdie and Attorney-General Deb Frecklington about whether the child safety department made referrals to police, the government reiterated that the matter was now subject to a coronial investigation.

Premier David Crisafulli says Cross Border Commissioner Bob Gee, who is representing the state on the national fuel supply taskforce, held his first meeting in that new role today.

Crisafulli told parliament:

Yesterday, the Commonwealth convened the first meeting of the national fuel supply task force. This morning, less than 24 hours later, our representative, Bob Gee, convened stakeholders from the fuel industry, agriculture, business and industry groups, freight and transport representatives. One message was very clear from all of them: and that is, we need a nationally consistent approach, we need information to flow and fuel to fill tanks in every part of our state.”

The Premier called on the Commonwealth to “share with Australians where the fuel blockages are and what they’re doing about it”, while pointing to the need for short, medium and long-term solutions.

We cannot continue to ignore that Australia has been at the mercy of foreign markets. Increased domestic supply protects our sovereignty, which increases our fuel security,” he said.

“That’s why, in February, before this crisis, we announced exploration in the Taroom Trough to pave the way for Australia’s first major oil discovery in a generation and more. That’s why we’ll be talking to companies about increasing their local storage options.

“And that’s why we should also be brave and admit that a nation of our size should have more than just two refineries.”

Crisafulli did not provide any additional detail about any such new oil refinery.

Here’s some of the key takeaways we reported yesterday from the first day back in this three-day parliamentary sitting:

• Transport Minister Brent Mickelberg has confirmed he will introduce laws this week to enact long-awaited changes to the use of e-bikes and e-scooters in the state after a parliamentary inquiry.
• Deputy Premier Jarrod Bleijie has announced a review of the Industrial Relations Act and workers’ compensation scheme by Glenn Ferguson AM and Gary Black, to begin this month, citing productivity and increases in psychological injury claims.
• Education Minister John-Paul Langbroek apologised while revealing about 10,500 state school teachers had been underpaid a total of about $8.7 million (or $830 on average) after a “human error” in the calculation of award rate rises.
• Both the government and opposition focused much of their attention on fuel prices, with the government claiming to have pushed the federal government into action and the opposition accusing the state of holding back on using some of its own powers.

Good morning, and welcome back to our coverage of another parliamentary sitting week here in Queensland.

We’ll have a shorter run today given the usual later Wednesday start, but will take you through the major takeaways up to the end of question time.

Strap in!