Queensland will start progressively re-opening schools from next week with the aim of having all students behind their desks before the end of the month.
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Students in Kindergarten, prep and year 1, as well as students in years 11 and 12, will return to their classrooms from May 11, Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk revealed on Monday.
The decision to reopen schools comes well before the May 15 deadline the Palaszczuk Government had previously set itself to make the announcement.
Schools are expected to be fully operational by May 25 and it's yet another step towards easing restrictions imposed to stymie the spread of COVID-19.
Queensland has recorded three more coronavirus cases to take the state's tally to 1038.
The new cases relate to people who had recently returned from London and Los Angeles while another had been on an overseas cruise.
Of the 1038 confirmed cases, just 52 are active with 46 located in southeast Queensland.
With reducing active cases, Ms Palaszczuk said the next easing of restrictions could relate to cafes and restaurants.
"Once our schools are back, we can absolutely then focus on getting our economy back," Ms Palaszczuk added.
"We can focus on people back into work, we can focus on the cafes and restaurants, we can focus on mining developments."
The first easing of restrictions was over the weekend. People were free to travel up to 50km from their home to shop, visit a park or even go to the drive-in.
However, they could only move about with members of their household and social distancing measures had to be maintained.
Although restrictions were relaxed, police issued 146 fines for breaches and found evidence of "reckless and terrible behaviour".
Commissioner Katarina Carroll said officers were dumbfounded after being called to the same noisy Gold Coast party house twice in two days.
Officers issued 25 fines to people in their 20s at the Carrara Airbnb home for breaching COVID-19 social distancing regulations.
Five people were at both parties.
"We've given the message out tens of thousands of times that you can't have parties, that you can't congregate in large groups," Commissioner Carroll said.
"To go back a second time I think we were all in disbelief. Completely unacceptable."
The partygoers received a total of $33,350 in fines.
Commissioner Carroll said she was also disappointed to see people cramming Burleigh Heads beach on Sunday evening.
She said police would be patrolling the area and erecting barricades to enforce social distancing on Monday.
Australian Associated Press
