In an era of intensified compliance expectations for aesthetic medicine providers, staying ahead of new legal obligations is imperative. As national regulators tighten their grip on cosmetic advertising, informed consent and scope-of-practice boundaries, a Queensland-only regulation added another layer to the compliance checklist.
Amid ongoing reforms reshaping the cosmetic medicine landscape, many Queensland aesthetic clinics may not yet be aware of recent amendments to the state’s Work Health and Safety Regulation 2011 (Qld).
Effective 1 March 2025, every person conducting a business or undertaking (PCBU) in Queensland – regardless of size – must have a written Sexual Harassment and Sex- or Gender-Based Harassment Prevention Plan in place under the Work Health and Safety (Sexual Harassment) Amendment Regulation 2024. Queensland is the first state to spell out a standalone documentation duty; elsewhere employers rely only on the federal positive duty in the Sex Discrimination Act 1984.
The new Queensland requirement reframes sexual and sex- or gender-based harassment as a workplace health and safety risk and introduces enforceable obligations around prevention, consultation and complaint handling.
What business owners need to know
Section 55H(2) of the amended Work Health and Safety Regulation sets out the minimum content. In practice, your plan must:
- Be written, accessible and understandable by all workers
- Clearly identify workplace risks of sexual harassment or sex/gender‑based harassment
- Outline specific control measures taken, with rationale
- Detail worker consultation undertaken while drafting the plan
- Include a robust reporting and investigation procedure, covering how complaints are lodged, processed and communicated to all parties
These measures aim to transform sexual harassment from a reactive policy after the fact into a proactive safety risk.
Penalties & updates
Failure to prepare, implement, inform staff or update the document attracts a maximum 60 penalty units (about $9,700) for an individual PCBU and five times that for a body corporate, even if no harassment occurs. Larger negligence cases may still trigger the general Work Health and Safety Regulation penalties that top $3 million.
Legislation mandates periodic reviews: every three years, or sooner if a harassment incident occurs or a workplace health and safety committee requests it.
What this means for aesthetic medical clinics
While this new requirement applies to all Queensland workplaces, it holds particular weight for aesthetic medical clinics, where procedures often occur in private, one-on-one settings. The inherently personal nature of cosmetic treatment, combined with the sensitive dynamics between practitioners and patients, can elevate the risk of perceived or actual misconduct if proper safeguards aren’t in place.
How to comply with the new Sexual Harassment and Sex- or Gender-Based Harassment Prevention Plan requirement
A prevention plan template has been developed by Workplace Health and Safety Queensland to support PCBUs to meet the requirements under the WHS Regulation Note that the template is not mandatory and PCBUs may choose to use other written documentation to support the prevention plan requirements.
You can view an example prevention plan here.
Workplace Health and Safety Queensland has also published a Guide to identifying and managing risks of workplace sexual harassment and sex or gender-based harassment.
The Guide for PCBUs details:
- what is sexual harassment and sex or gender-based harassment
- examples of sexual harassment and sex or gender-based harassment
- what are the risks related to sexual harassment and sex or gender-based harassment
- how PCBUs manage the risks – applying a four-step risk management process (identify the hazard, assess the risk, control the risk and review risk controls)
- steps to prepare and implement a prevention plan.
You can find more resources on the new Sexual Harassment and Sex- or Gender-Based Harassment Regulation here.
