The Australian Women's Register

Summary

Patricia Audrey (Pat) Moore (formerly Voss, nee Kelly) initially worked as a pharmacist before becoming a highly regarded patent barrister of the New South Wales Bar and a senior member of the Administrative Appeals Tribunal. She undertook the Materia Medica course at the University of Sydney and graduated in 1946. As a teaching fellow in pharmacy at the University, for a time the then Miss Patricia Kelly was the only woman on the School’s teaching staff. In 1950 she was president of the Women’s Pharmacy Association, which boasted over 100 members across New South Wales. In 1953 Moore (then as the recently married Mrs John Voss) left for London with her husband, a doctor: he to attend the Royal College of Physicians; she to pursue postgraduate study in pharmacy. She was admitted to the Bar on 4 June 1971 along with friend and fellow pioneer Priscilla Flemming, who became the first woman in private practice at the New South Wales Bar to take silk. She read with Ken Handley, who later took silk and became a judge of the New South Wales Court of Appeal, and she was frequently briefed by Pat Hinch, a well-known woman solicitor. Moore also served as a part-time member of the Social Security Appeals Tribunal.