From the Courier Mail, Brisbane,
(7th May, 2008)

Queensland set to earn its first official nude beach
from Gabrielle Dunlevy and Jessica Marszalek

PREPARE to drop your dacks - Queensland looks set to finally catch up with the rest of Australia and get its first official nude beach.
    All states and territories except Queensland have had designated clothing-optional beaches since South Australia declared the first, Maslin Beach near Adelaide, in 1975.
    The Sunshine Coast has an unofficial nude beach in a national park area at Alexandria Bay, but enthusiasts have long lobbied for a legal beach.
    Queensland Premier Anna Bligh and newly-elected Sunshine Coast Mayor Bob Abbot have announced they will not oppose a submission from the Free Beaches Association, calling for one of three proposed beaches to be made clothing-optional.
    Association secretary Anita Grigg said the preferred beach was Mudjimba, in a secluded area north of Maroochydore.
    Ms Grigg said nudists had been discriminated against, while other interest groups, like dog owners, were given large tracts of beach to use.
    "In all areas that we as nudists have tried to find a little quiet spot where we could sunbake nude and mind our own business ... we have been persecuted," she said.
    The beach would attract not only 500 local enthusiasts, but tourists from interstate and overseas, particularly the US and Europe, Ms Grigg said.
    The group's Nude Olympics draws about 600 people annually, but that number could double with a legal beach.
    "Tourists from overseas ring up and when we say we don't have a beach that's legal they say, `We don't want to be locked up'," Ms Grigg said.
    "We are losing huge amounts of tourism dollars."
    Ms Bligh said she was happy to work with the Sunshine Coast Regional Council.
    "If they decide to go ahead with it and they require any state laws .to change then I'm happy to work with the council to make that possible," she said.
    "Frankly this is not everybody's cup of tea but I do think that most people would prefer that this sort of activity is conducted on a private beach away from families and away from people who don't want to see that sort of thing on their beaches."
    Ms Bligh said she appreciated the council was trying to strike a balance between families' needs and a niche tourism market, but did not want to see nude beaches cropping up across the Queensland coastline.
    "I don't understand it myself, but I accept that there are some people, not just locally but from around the world, who seek out these sorts of opportunities," she said.