Story of the "Lost" Death Records

From the beginning of our journey to discover who is buried at Rose Lane, the main stumbling block has been the lack of documentary evidence of deaths in Herberton between 1880 and 1885.  We know that all the deaths would have been registered, but where?   

Eventually we were able to ascertain that the death records for our town were sent to the Deputy Registrar in Cardwell and included in their Death Register.  At that time Cardwell was a significant township and Herberton was located within the Parish of Cardwell.  In 1886, Herberton itself was significant enough to have it's own Deputy Registrar of Deaths and these were recorded and held locally.  The Register subsequently was held at the Atherton Court House and we were allowed to view it 3 years ago.  We aren't sure where it is now.

It would seem when Cardwell became "less important" all their records were sent to Brisbane and archived, so it's been a while since they would have been viewed by the public.  It took us a long time to discover that the Cardwell Death Register is held in the Qld State Archives, but is owned by Qld Justice Dept - Births, Deaths and Marriages and cannot be viewed without their permission.  Despite many requests, such permission hasn't been granted.  They state they are preserving these records, but for what purpose?  The records originated in our town and we are researching them, why can't we see them?  The preservation process should include all Registers being digitised and once digitised they should be freely available to researchers.