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The more than 70 applicants were deprived of their human rights, the Queensland Supreme Court found on Tuesday.

The highest court in Queensland has ruled in favour of more than 60 police officers and staff and a dozen paramedics who lost their jobs or were facing disciplinary action for refusing Covid-19 injections.

The landmark, 115-page decision, handed down Tuesday morning, found that the injection mandate imposed by Katarina Carroll, Commissioner of the Queensland Police Service (QPS), was “unlawful” under the state’s Human Rights Act.

Justice Glenn Martin, who oversaw the case, also ruled that former Queensland Health director-general John Wakefield’s injection mandate for paramedics was “of no effect”.

“I am not satisfied that the Commissioner [Ms Carroll] has demonstrated that she gave proper consideration to the human rights that might have been affected by her decisions,” Justice Martin wrote in his ruling.

“By failing to give proper consideration, the making of each of those decisions was unlawful.”

The Queensland Supreme Court has restrained both Ms Carroll and Mr Wakefield from enforcing their mandates or taking any disciplinary action against the workers who brought the suit.

Over 200 Queensland Police Service members, including officers and other staff, were ultimately suspended over non-compliance with the December 2021 mandate, and almost 40 were sacked. Nine officers remained suspended as they awaited Tuesday’s decision.

Mr Wakefield resigned from his post in March 2022, while Ms Carroll announced her resignation earlier this month. Their departures are among a chain of sudden resignations that have included former Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk in December last year and the state’s Attorney-General Yvette D’Ath last week.

The former Chief Health Officer of Queensland, Jeannette Young, also quit her role in November 2021 to become the state’s Governor.

Likely Class Action Lawsuits Ahead

This week’s massive lawsuit, which included three seperate applications, was helped along with funding from United Australia Party (UAP) Chairman Clive Palmer.

“It’s a great day for Queensland,” Mr Palmer said during a press conference in front of Brisbane’s Supreme Court following the ruling.

He explained that he was “happy” to fund further legal recourse, including a possible class action lawsuit, in order to secure compensation for workers whose human rights had been violated.

The business tycoon also mourned the Australians killed via compulsory injections.

“What’s more uncertain is the people who have died,” Mr Palmer said. “The class action won’t do much for those people that have taken the vaccine and have perished.”

The Australian has affirmed the likelihood of further litigation against Covid-era mandates, citing experts who see Tuesday’s decision as the “tip of the iceberg” and the first of many possible cases “in similar jurisdictions likely to ride on the coat-tails of the successful action”.

The national broadsheet also quoted Jack McGuire, director of Red Union, a group that has supported many professionals harmed by injection mandates. He said the win in Queensland “bodes well for our hundreds of human rights cases that we have on foot”.

The Australian likewise reported that this week’s result has “reignited” calls for a Covid-19 Royal Commission.

The 74 applicants were represented in court by law firms Sibley Lawyers and Alexander Law, the latter having previously acted for both Mr Palmer and Israel Folau in his bid to return to rugby league.

A Violation of Human Rights?

Queensland human rights barrister Hugh Carter told The Australian that it was highly likely the government would appeal the decision.

“I don’t think it’s over by a long shot,” he said, “but we know the court found there was an overreach by government in terms of coercing people into being vaccinated when they didn’t want to for genuine reason.”

While affirming the ruling, Queensland Health Minister Shannon Fentiman disputed that the QPS mandates were in violation of human rights.

She claimed that Justice Martin “did not find that mandatory Covid vaccinations were contrary to the Human Rights Act” — and that instead it was a “very technical decision” about “how directions were issued”.

However, in his ruling, the Justice Martin clearly argued that QPS issued its mandate based on assumptions about the spread of Covid-19 between police officers and members of the community — assumptions the service “did not have any information about” even 18 months into the pandemic.

This was among the many reasons Justice Martin concluded in his ruling, “I am not satisfied that the Commissioner has demonstrated that she gave proper consideration to the human rights that might have been affected by her decisions,” in reference to Section 58 of Queensland’s Human Rights Act.

Section 58 lists no specific human rights, and therefore by definition refers to other human rights within the act — among which are protection from “medical or scientific experimentation or treatment without the person’s full, free and informed consent” (Section 17c), “freedom of movement” (Section 19), “taking part in public life” (23), and the “right to liberty and security of person” (Section 29).

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