Q+A was created as Q&A by founding executive producer Peter McEvoy,[1] Presented by Tony Jones, the show premiered on Thursday, 22 May 2008, at 9:35 pm on ABC TV, featuring a solo appearance by prime minister Kevin Rudd.

From the following week, it adopted a regular format of panellists, generally comprising politicians and three additional people representing various sectors of society and occupations.

[1] Virginia Trioli, Annabel Crabb, Julia Baird, Tom Ballard, and Jeremy Fernandez filled in for Jones while he was on leave.

[18][19] The three rotating hosts, Stan Grant, David Speers, and Virginia Trioli, were appointed to continue in an ongoing capacity through until July 2022.

[23] On 25 October 2010, former Prime Minister John Howard had a pair of shoes thrown at him from a member of the audience due to responses on his attitude to the Iraq War.

The group unfurled a banner over the back of the set and began to chant at Minister for Education Christopher Pyne, before they were removed from the studio while the live broadcast was replaced with footage of a musical performance from an earlier episode.

[29] The Zaky Mallah incident stirred great controversy and led to a boycott of Q+A by the Abbott government, after a former terror suspect was invited to ask a question of a minister from the live audience.

[33] Prior to his appearance on the program, Mallah had tweeted derogatorily and lewdly about two female News Ltd columnists, Miranda Devine and Rita Panahi, mentioning gang banging them.

[40] Mallah later was directed to respond, saying "The Liberals now have just justified to many Australian Muslims in the community tonight to leave and go to Syria and join ISIS because of ministers like him".

[47] The decision was criticised by Labor deputy leader Tanya Plibersek,[48] and Prime Minister Tony Abbott[49][50][51] banned members of his frontbench appearing on the program.

[53] Substantially negative coverage of the ABC's conduct appeared in News Corporation-owned papers,[54][55] including The Daily Telegraph[56] and The Australian.

[63][64] A crowdfunding campaign was started to buy him a new toaster, which played on O'Dwyer's remarks about depreciation treatment for small business, namely cafes.

Panellists included Mona Eltahawy; author Jess Hill; Nayuka Gorrie; Ashton Applewhite; Hana Assafiri; and host, Fran Kelly.

The ABC posted an explanation of the incident afterwards on the Q+A website:[72]Sasha Gillies-Lekakis did not ask the question that he had agreed[a] and what he said instead contained major inaccuracies.

As the program developed, Stan Grant, a highly experienced presenter of live TV, was aware that other audience members were distressed.

The ABC fully supports his judgement and handling of this situation.Discussion of the incident followed in the media, with commentators agreeing that Gillies-Lukakis deserved a strong rebuttal for "promoting Russian propaganda", but that sending him out gave the appearance of "weakness rather than the moral and intellectual strength these times demand".

[85][86][87] In March 2015, during a debate on feminism, Liberal Deputy Leader Julie Bishop told the audience that she did not believe Tony Jones interrupted her because of gender, but because of her politics.

[89] After the Mallah incident, former Liberal Prime Minister Tony Abbott reportedly told his party room that the program is a "lefty lynch mob".

[90] The Australian journalist Janet Albrechtsen wrote that she was boycotting the program because "Free speech on Q+A means stacking the panel, the audience and the questions to skew left.

[91] Liberal power broker Michael Kroger and conservative journalists Miranda Devine and Tom Switzer also boycott the show.

[83] Broadcaster Steve Price described a July 2016 question put to him about violence against women and the ensuing verbal altercation he had with journalist Van Badham as an "ambush".

Price's comment was made in the wake of widespread public condemnation for his repeatedly interrupting Badham and insisting she was "hysterical" as she responded to a questioner who had described the violent murder of his sister.