Radiation Safety Act 1999 (Queensland)

Table of Contents

1. Source documents

  • Official PDF retained locally — current as at 23 September 2025; retrieved 16 September 2026.
  • Extracted text
  • Provenance and SHA-256 metadata

2. Authority and jurisdiction

  • Queensland Act; legally binding primary legislation in Queensland.
  • Establishes the legal framework under which licences, radiation safety standards, compliance certificates, approved radiation safety and protection plans (RSPPs), radiation safety officers (RSOs), monitoring, enforcement and reporting operate.
  • Exact obligations depend on the Act together with the Radiation Safety Regulation 2021, applicable standards, licence conditions and approvals.

3. Key takeaways

  • The Act's object is to protect people and the environment from the harmful effects of particular sources of ionising and non-ionising radiation (s 4).
  • Its radiation-protection principles are justification, limitation and optimisation (s 5). Patient therapeutic exposure is governed through justification and optimisation rather than occupational or public dose limits.
  • Possession and use are licensed activities (pt 2). Sources and premises may also need current certificates of compliance against statutory radiation safety standards (pt 3).
  • A possession licensee must have an approved RSPP for the radiation practice, take reasonable steps to ensure compliance with it and make it available as required (ss 28–34).
  • The possession licensee appoints an appropriately qualified RSO; the RSO performs the statutory functions prescribed under the Act and Regulation (ss 35–37).
  • The Act controls the whole source lifecycle: acquisition, supply, relocation, disposal and abandonment, as well as exposure monitoring and mandatory reporting.
  • The approved THHS RSPP is therefore a legally significant local control, but it does not replace the Act, Regulation, standards, licence conditions or individual duties.

4. Summary

4.1. Part 1 — Preliminary

  • States the object, the three radiation-protection principles and the interpretive framework (ss 3–7).

4.2. Part 2 — Licences

  • Establishes possession, use and transport licences; application, assessment, conditions, terms, amendment, suspension and cancellation provisions.
  • A licence authorises only the activities and sources within its scope and conditions.

4.3. Part 3 — Radiation safety standards and certificates of compliance

  • Allows radiation safety standards to be made (s 16) and requires prescribed sources and premises to comply and hold certificates where applicable (ss 17–18).
  • This is the legal bridge to the Queensland premises and apparatus standards listed in the 2021 Standards Notice.

4.4. Parts 4 and 5 — Source acquisition, supply, relocation and disposal

  • Controls dealings across the source lifecycle, including approvals and notifications for acquisition or relocation and requirements for supply, disposal and abandonment.

4.5. Part 6 — Other radiation safety, protection and security provisions

4.5.1. Division 1 — Radiation safety and protection plans

  • Requires the possession licensee to prepare, submit and maintain an RSPP appropriate to each radiation practice (ss 28–34).
  • The approved plan operationalises local measures for hazards, access, training, safe work, monitoring, equipment, premises, records and incidents. Compliance with it is a statutory obligation, not merely departmental preference.

4.5.2. Divisions 1A and 1B — Security plans

  • Provide for security plans and transport security plans where prescribed sources or activities trigger them.

4.5.3. Division 2 — Radiation safety officers

  • Requires appointment of a qualified RSO and establishes the RSO's statutory place in the governance system (ss 35–37).

4.5.4. Divisions 3–8 — Monitoring, procedures, exposure control and reporting

  • Provide for monitoring (ss 38–40), diagnostic and therapeutic procedures (s 41), exposure limitation (ss 42–42A), additional obligations of licensees and others (ss 43–44B), dangerous-event reporting (s 45), and prohibited sources or practices (ss 47–47A).

4.6. Parts 7–13 — Instruments, enforcement and administration

  • Govern applications and decisions, inspectors and enforcement powers, the Radiation Advisory Council, review rights, proceedings, registers and information, and miscellaneous administration.

4.7. Part 14 and schedules

  • Contains repeal and transitional provisions. Schedule 1 identifies reviewable decisions; Schedule 2 defines key terms.

5. Important definitions, roles, limits and records

Possession licensee
The licensed entity with overarching control and resource obligations for the practice.
Use licensee
An individual authorised by licence to use a source within the licence scope and conditions.
Approved RSPP
The regulator-approved local plan required under pt 6; THHS must implement and comply with it.
RSO
The qualified person appointed to perform statutory radiation-safety functions and advise/report to the possession licensee.
Dose limits
The Act creates the duty to prevent prescribed limits being exceeded; numerical limits are prescribed in sch 5 of the Regulation.
Records
The framework requires records supporting licences, approvals, monitoring, exposure, source control, compliance and reportable events; details are distributed across the Act, Regulation, instruments and approved plan.

6. Practical relationship to the THHS RSPP

  • Direct legal parent of the RSPP: ss 28–34 require and give regulatory significance to the approved plan.
  • Supports the RSPP's licensing, governance, RSO, personal-monitoring, source-lifecycle, incident-reporting and compliance-certificate controls.
  • Departmental procedures and records demonstrate implementation, but cannot weaken an Act, Regulation, standard, approval or licence condition.

7. See Also