This is from personal experience.

2 cars owned by my sister in law and her husband, rego in NSW, only just gone through blue slip inspection a matter of a couple of weeks before they decided to relocate back to Qld.

I had been under the impression that the NSW system was pretty strict. But when both cars needed windscreens, one needed all 4 CV boots and joints replaced, steering boots replaced, rear brakes were leaking fluid and the muffler and rear part of the exhaust was so rotten it required replacement too, my question is how could these have just passed a blue slip?

Is the Qld safety certificate system a lot stricter? We have no annual inspection process here, the cars were both late 90's small Fords.

Is the NSW blue slip just a walk in sign off and go on your merry way? Or did they just fluke a dodgy garage 2 years running? I know a lot of border dwellers or relocators leave cars registered in Qld to avoid the change over. Interested to hear other opinions particularly from south of the border.

id say two dodgy both times

I once passed a blue slip with no 1st gear. Apparently they are only interested in safety items, brakes, ball joints, tail lights, seat belt ect. Even cracked windscreens will pass if the crack is not in direct view of the driver.

Blue slip just ads another item to the regular pink slip checklist and that is vehicle identity where they check the vin and all that crapola.

Often on this forum you will read a post asking for information re "VW friendly blue slip inspectors" ie, an inspector who know Dubs and won't pick things that are hard to avoid in these old cars (like oil leaks maybe ?) if an inspector is doing his job properly then the things that were mentioned in the original post won't get through but we all know that there are those people / organisations out there who are happy to just give anything the tick and take your money, that doesn't make the system faulty, just the people doing the wrong thing. I can't comment on other states but in NSW you don't need a pink slip for rego unless the car is over 5 years old. (Maybe 3, can't remember exactly) but we all know that a poorly maintained vehicle can have dangerous faults appear in a tme span less than that, just another glitch in a system that is not perfect but the one we have to live with.
My 2 cents worth (rounded up to 5 cents)

Well in Vic. A vehicle registered in 1971 will never be checked for anything ever, as long as the original ower has paid rego every year. The checks are only if you change ownership.

Unless the rego has run out, there is no requirement for a roadworthy in Tas.

When we lived in Vic in was just a matter of ring any number of dodgy RWC providers, giving them the details over the phone and collecting the certificate. The car yards where the worst offenders.

In Qld it's only needed to register a car that is unregistered or to transfer ownership into your name. Generally the good places are pretty strict but fair. Many are familiar with older cars and adjust the rules slightly within the parameters of the law to avoid unnecessary failures.

My $6k kombi had a list, not too long, of things it needed for rwc, but nothing too savage (tyres, front brake lines, steering box rubber, horn short circuit, window tint too dark and 2 cracked side windows). Not much really and all rectified by the seller before I collected it. The inspector let the few oil drips slip through because he understood it was a 40 year old car.

Like landfall says, the car yards are the worst. There is/was a dealer here in Brisbane who used to sell unregistered cars in any range of condition from bad to worse, but they ran and drove, the kind of stuff that wholesales at auction. Mostly prices under a grand so they would have been getting them for nothing. Then when you bought one, you would take it to a rwc place they told you about, pay around double the going rate and get a clean rwc. Car dealer was in the clear, no warranty and no liability, rwc place was in the clear because they gave the car "2 inspections" dated the same day with some items repaired to make it look convincing, but tickled the kms entered on the certificate so it would expire in around 50km, just enough to drive to the local transport office and register it, after which time the inspection station could not be held liable for any faults, all back on the driver. Did it for years. I bought a $1500 XY falcon there in 1993 and they were still going in 2009 (yes bought another one there and the owner even remembered me and the other car). They moved about a lot though, changed locations about every 6 months.

I guess it goes to show any system can be bent or broken.

Pinkslips aren't much better, I'm a bike mechanic by trade, some of the bikes that come in to the shop that guys have just done P's tests on have had leaking forkseals all over the front brakes, one had a bald FRONT tyre down to the canvas... a lot of it could be natural selection but some people can get anything passed, have a listen to the average Hardly Drivable (harleys) with thier obnoxious exhausts..
I'm seen as a picky fucker when I pick up on these things.. some people really get the shits.
Had one old guy have a sook when I told him the original tyre on his 1971 two stroker didn't pass cause it had cracks in the sidewalls down to the canvas.. After all it was only his daughter learning to ride on it..