Advocacy group Sisters Inside has condemned the Queensland Government's proposal to reintroduce the offence of public drunkenness, arguing the change would increase police contact and detention for Aboriginal people - particularly those experiencing poverty and homelessness.
The offence was removed in 2024 after long-running calls to end criminal penalties for public intoxication, a reform Sisters Inside says aligned with recommendations from the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody.
Sisters Inside CEO Debbie Kilroy said the proposal was not about safety and would expand police powers and custody pathways.
"Queensland doesn't need Aboriginal people or organisations like ours to explain the impact of these laws," she said.
"The government knows exactly what it is doing... it knows who will be targeted, who will be arrested and who will end up in cells.
"Reintroducing these offences is a deliberate political choice to expand police powers, increase surveillance of public space, and funnel more Aboriginal people, particularly poor, homeless, and criminalised people, into police cells, watch houses, courts and prisons."
Ms Kilroy said Aboriginal families would view the proposal through the lens of deaths in custody.
"Every time governments claim these laws are about "safety," Aboriginal families hear something else: more police contact, more arrests for poverty, more time in cells, and more risk of death," Ms Kilroy said.
"We have been here before. Public drunkenness laws were the entry point for countless Aboriginal deaths in custody. Reintroducing them is not just reckless, it is an act of historical denial.
"If the LNP was serious about safety, it would be investing in housing, health services, alcohol and other drug support, public toilets, and community-led responses. Instead, it has reached for the bluntest and most dangerous tool it knows: criminalisation."
The Queensland Government's move comes a year after the Northern Territory moved to wind back public drunkenness laws.
Ms Kilroy said the Queensland Government's proposal sat within a broader law-and-order agenda, while urging the state not to return to past settings.
"This move sits squarely within a broader pattern for the LNP - tougher bail laws, expanded police powers, increased imprisonment, and a refusal to listen to Aboriginal people when they say: this system is killing them," she said.
"This is not about urination in the streets, it is about who the state chooses to punish, who it chooses to police and whose lives it treats as disposable.
"Queensland does not need a return to laws that were condemned more than 30 years ago. It needs courage to break from a system that cages Aboriginal people and then acts surprised when the body count keeps rising."
A spokesperson for Attorney-General and Minister for Justice and Minister for Integrity, Deb Frecklington, said the government was considering concerns raised about antisocial behaviour.
"We want Queenslanders to feel safe enjoying their local communities, and we're giving careful consideration to concerns around antisocial behaviour," the spokesperson said.
