The Australian Women's Register

Jean Malor has the distinction of having been the first female student to graduate from the University of Sydney with first-class honours in Law. Although admitted to practise in 1937, Malor rejected going to the New South Wales Bar in favour of a career with the Law Book Company of Australasia Pty Ltd. (This may have been because her brother, Ronald, soon to be killed in the Second World War, was already a promising junior at the Bar). With the outbreak of war, she became honorary secretary of the Law School Comforts Fund. Malor remained at the Law Book Company until she was 60, rising to become senior legal advisor and senior editor and highly regarded for her knowledge and proficiency. In 1973, she was appointed chairwoman of the Commonwealth Computerisation of Legal Data Committee, one of a number of committees and professional organisations to which she gave much of her time and expertise over many years. Retained by Butterworths Pty Ltd in 1977, she was editor responsible for The Australian Current Law Digest and Commonwealth Statutes Annotations. She continued to work until she was in her 80s. On 3 June 1978, Malor’s prodigious legal knowledge and lifelong dedication as an editor were recognised when she was awarded an OBE for her services to the legal profession.

Marie Sexton (nee Kinsella) co-drafted the constitution of the Women Lawyers’ Association of New South Wales and was the organisation’s first honorary secretary. The eldest of five children of Edward Parnell (Ted) Kinsella and his Belgian wife, Marie Louise Josephine Graff, the then Kinsella matriculated from Fort Street Girls’ High School and went on to earn three qualifications from the University of Sydney: a Bachelor of Arts in 1943; a Diploma in Education in 1944; and a Bachelor of Laws in 1949. (It was during a year-long stint as teaching assistant at Inverell High School in northern New South Wales that Kinsella decided that teaching was not for her, had her last day on 29 January 1945 and thence turned her sights to the study of law). She began working as an associate to her father, then Mr Justice Kinsella of the Industrial Commission of New South Wales. On 18 January 1950, Mr Justice Kinsella was elevated to the Supreme Court of New South Wales; Kinsella became clerk associate to her father and clerk of arraigns. Although admitted to the New South Wales Bar on 11 February 1949, Kinsella did not practise at the Bar. She later worked in the Department of Territories, Sydney, and the Attorney-General’s Department in Canberra, producing the respected Annotated Constitution. Kinsella retired in 1980.

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.

Hilda Maude Maddocks, the sixth woman to be admitted to the New South Wales Bar, was educated at Fort Street Girls’ High School and the University of Sydney, where she graduated with a Bachelor of Laws in 1939 and was a student in the Faculty of Economics. When war broke out, she became honorary treasurer of the Law School Comforts Fund. At the time of her admission to the New South Wales Bar on 26 May 1939, she was employed in the legal branch of the Department of Road Transport & Tramways where her father, Sydney Aubrey Maddocks, himself a law graduate of the University of Sydney and formerly on the list of non-practising barristers at the New South Wales Bar, had been commissioner. Five years later, having joined the Commonwealth Crown Solicitor’s Office, she was admitted as a solicitor, on 26 May 1944. On 1 February 1962, Hilda Maude (now Catalano) was appointed legal officer, Crown Solicitor’s Office, Department of the Attorney-General and of Justice; her designation was altered to solicitor on 1 September 1962. She retired on 7 August 1973.

Dr Klara Rudlow was a refugee who arrived in Australia on 24 September 1938 from Vienna where she had worked as a judge’s associate and journalist. Despite her experience, and being equipped with a Doctor of Laws from the University of Vienna (which she had obtained in 1933), her qualifications were not recognised in New South Wales and her facility with the English language was insufficient for her to obtain articles. It was not until 4 December 1953 that Rudlow, having undertaken the Barristers’ Admission Board course, was finally admitted to the Bar. In the intervening years she had worked as a translator and interpreter (she spoke several languages). Rudlow also broadcast and wrote on cultural and assimilation issues. In 1951 she travelled to Europe under the auspices of the International Refugee Organisation. She had scarce work at the Bar and coached students undertaking the Solicitors’ and Barristers’ Admission Board examinations as a means of augmenting her income. On 13 March 1959, Rudlow was admitted as a solicitor and from 1960 had her own practice. She subsequently lived and worked in Darling Street, Balmain for many years, volunteering for the Balmain Association and even standing for local government, although she was not successful.

Stephanie Pape (nee Prouting) worked for nearly a decade in the Public Solicitor’s Office in Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea, during which time she rose from the position of legal officer to that of deputy public solicitor. The then Prouting graduated from the University of Sydney with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1949, followed by a Bachelor of Laws degree in 1963. Despite being admitted to the New South Wales Bar, she did not practise as a barrister, working first at the Commonwealth Crown Solicitor’s Office before transferring to Port Moresby in 1964. On 26 June 1966, she married Richard Pape, author of Boldness Be My Friend (1953), which was an account of his wartime experiences as a prisoner of war. After returning to Australia, she joined the Attorney-General’s Department in Canberra.

Zena Sachs made a valuable contribution to the law and its practitioners during a long career in academia. The daughter of Jewish immigrants who had originally moved from Poland, she attended North Newtown Primary School and the academically selective Sydney Girls High School. Equipped with a secretarial qualification, in 1947 she went to work for Julius Stone, the then Challis Professor of Jurisprudence and International Law at the University of Sydney. Encouraged by Stone to undertake a university course, she embarked upon a law degree in 1946, graduating in 1950. On 1 December 1950, she was admitted to the New South Wales Bar. She did not practise, however, instead becoming Stone’s research (graduate) assistant and remaining with him for four decades. Stone dedicated Human Law and Human Justice (1965) to her in recognition of her inestimable support and diligent work. Sachs was a founding member and honorary secretary of the Women Lawyers’ Association (WLA) of New South Wales. Made a life member, she was honoured at the WLA’s 50th anniversary gala dinner at Parliament House in Sydney in 2002.

Joyce Shewcroft has been described as ‘the first female corporation lawyer in Australia’. She achieved the additional distinction of being the country’s first female chair of a credit union when she chaired the Australian Broadcasting Commission (ABC) credit union, which she also co-founded. She was the first woman in New South Wales to qualify for the Bar through private study and the Barristers’ Admission Board examination. Admitted to the Bar on 29 May 1942 while in the employ of the ABC, she did not go into private practice until the late 1970s, instead remaining with the ABC for more than three decades, during which time she became its legal advisor. A motivated and able student, Shewcroft graduated with a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Sydney on 15 April 1953. She was secretary-treasurer of the PEN Club (Sydney branch), wrote prize-winning poetry, and scripts for radio. She was honorary legal advisor to the NSW Medical Women’s Association and the Royal Academy of Dance. Shewcroft succeeded Nerida Goodman (nee Cohen) as the second president of the Women Lawyers’ Association of New South Wales and was a member of the Association’s Research Committee. On 31 December 1977 she was awarded an OBE for services to the ABC and the law. Shewcroft was later appointed by the Australian Council For Overseas Aid as a commissioner of an Independent Inquiry into East Timor.

When self-government was conferred on the Northern Territory in 1978, Juliet Shields (nee Baxter), who had been employed as a clerk with the Northern Territory Administration of the Commonwealth Public Service, became responsible for the Commercial Division of the Territory’s new Department of Law. In a role which spanned almost 20 years, she managed numerous of the Government’s major commercial transactions. In 1951, Baxter (as she was then) was the recipient of a Commonwealth Scholarship; she was appointed as a junior clerk in the Public Trust Office in the same year. On 25 January 1954, Baxter commenced as a clerk (Professional Division) in the Crown Solicitor’s Office. Two years later, she graduated with a Bachelor of Laws from the University of Sydney. She was admitted to practice as a barrister (New South Wales) and solicitor (Northern Territory and High Court of Australia). In 1959, she married and moved to Darwin, where she worked for the then Crown Law Officer, Ronald (Ron) Withnall. At one time she was a chairperson of the Agents Licensing Board. Shields enjoyed a number of creative outlets, including acting and dressmaking.

May Moore was a successful photographer who worked initially in New Zealand and then in Sydney. She specialised in portraits of prominent people and artists, including society/celebrity portraits, with some wedding and children’s portraits. Moore is known to have introduced bromide paper and mounting boards to New Zealand.

Margarita Adam (nee Teddo) graduated from the University of Sydney with a Bachelor of Laws degree in 1966 and was admitted to the New South Wales Bar on 18 March of that year. She had not been at the Bar long before she took up legal reporting, for which she adopted the use of a pseudonym derived from her initial and surname. Adam, whose reports appeared in the New South Wales Reports, the Argus Reports and the Australian Law Reports, remained on the practising barristers’ list until the mid-1970s. She obtained work with Butterworths as an editor and indexer.

The Hon. Margaret Joan Beazley AO, AC was an Australian judge. She was both the first woman to sit as a Judge of Appeal on the New South Wales Court of Appeal in 1996, and the first woman to occupy the position of President of that Court in 2013. She retired from that court in 2019.

She has been described as a “fierce advocate for women in the legal profession”, and in 2006 was designated an Officer of the Order of Australia for her “service to the judiciary and the law, particularly through contributions to professional and ethical standards, to the advancement of women in the legal profession and the community.”

She was sworn in as Governor of New South Wales in May 2019, and made a companion (AC) in the general division of the Order of Australia on Australia Day, 2020 for her eminent service to the people of New South Wales, particularly through leadership roles in the judiciary, and as a mentor of young women lawyers.

Go to ‘Details’ below to read an essay written by Margaret Beazley for the Trailblazing Women and the Law Project.

Louise Vardanega PSM is Chief Operating Officer of the Australian Government Solicitor (AGS), a role she has held since 2009.

Louise joined AGS (then known as the Deputy Crown Solicitor’s Office) in 1975, and with the exception of 6 months attending legal workshop and 3 months with the Justice and Family Law Division of the Attorney General’s Department in 1977, has been with AGS throughout her career.

Go to ‘Details’ below to read an essay written by Andrew Sikorski about Louise Vardanega for the Trailblazing Women and the Law Project.

The third woman to actively practise at the New South Wales Bar, Ann Bernard (nee Davis) had a number of uncommon strings to her bow, including being a pilot and prize-winning shooter. Married to Lionel Bernard, a returned First World War serviceman, she lived in Fiji in the 1920s and ’30s and worked as a law clerk to the then governor, Sir Henry Scott. In 1938, she went to Oxford to study law. Considered to have a first-rate legal mind, on 25 June 1941 she was admitted to Middle Temple amid scenes of great destruction wrought by recent Second World War bombings of the Temple’s buildings. On 29 October 1941, she was called to the New South Wales Bar, whereupon she proceeded to be involved in some of that decade’s high-profile cases, including acting for suffragette, Adela Pankhurst Walsh. Bernard returned to Fiji in 1954, adopted a daughter, Angela, and established a wide practice for which she gained a reputation for taking on unpopular causes. In 1973, following her retirement to Concord, Sydney in the 1960s, she was tragically killed by a car while out walking one afternoon. Bernard’s portrait by Mary Edwards hangs in the New South Wales Bar Association’s Common Room.

One of nine children of prominent NSW Labour politician Gregory McGirr, Beatrice Bateman was the moving force behind the establishment of the Women Lawyers’ Association of New South Wales in 1952. She attended the Loreto Convent in Kirribilli and graduated from the University of Sydney with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1938, a Master of Arts in 1940 (study undertaken after she was prevented by the Law School from sitting her final exams due to being pregnant with her first child), and finally, a Bachelor of Laws in 1942. Bateman was admitted to practise on 31 July 1942, but being mother to seven meant that her practice was intermittent. She was an active fundraiser for a host of causes and represented Australia at the first International Congress of the World Movement of Mothers in 1950. During her final two years of practice at the Bar, she succeeded in defending a woman charged with murder. Bateman died suddenly in 1960 at the age of 43 following an asthma attack. Her daughter, Beatrice Gray (nee Bateman), was admitted to the Bar on 9 February 1968. A portrait of Beatrice Bateman by Sylvia Davis was a finalist in the 1942 Archibald Prize.

Professor Rosalind Croucher AM is a leading legal academic and current (2016) president of the Australian Law Reform Commission (ALRC). In 2014, she was the inaugural winner of the Australian Woman Lawyer (AWL) Award. She was described as:

‘an inspirational leader in the legal community, making a distinct contribution to law reform and legal education across the national stage. She has enthusiastically taken on ‘tough’ roles with great success and is a true institution builder. Prof Croucher restored the reputation of Macquarie Law School and successfully steered the ALRC through two inquiries which threatened the ALRC’s very existence. At the ALRC she has led seven inquiries of great public policy significance, including on family violence, older workers, and disability. She is also an exceptional mentor, with a deep and abiding commitment to fostering the careers of others, particularly women.’

Professor Croucher was appointed President of the Australian Human Rights Commission, 30 July 2017, for a seven year term.

Peg Lusink was the first Victorian woman appointed to the Judiciary and also the second woman appointed to the Family Court, when it began operations in 1976. Prior to her judicial appointment, Peg was a Partner at Corr and Corr, working principally in the areas of matrimonial causes and family law. She briefly practiced at the Melbourne Bar before becoming a Family Court Judge. Upon retirement from the Family Court, in 1990, Peg became one of the foundational Professors in the Law Faculty at Bond University. In 1996, Peg accepted another judicial appointment, becoming the President of the Commonwealth Professional Services Review Tribunal. In that same year she was appointed AM for law for services to the Family Court and the community.

Peg Lusink was interviewed by Kim Rubenstein for the Trailblazing Women and the Law Oral History Project. For details of the interview see the National Library of AustraliaCATALOGUE RECORD.

When Karen Fryar was appointed as a magistrate of the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) Magistrates Court on 6 September 1993, she became the first woman to be appointed to the judiciary in the ACT. In 2008 she was awarded the ACT International Women’s Day Women’s Award. On 26 January 2010 she was appointed as a Member of the Order of Australia ‘for service to the community of the ACT as a magistrate and through contributions to the prevention of family violence’.

Please click ‘Details” below to read an essay written by Karen Fryar for the Trailblazing Women and the Law Project.

Cate Faehrmann filled the casual vacancy left by the Greens member Lee Rhiannon in the New South Wales Legislative Council in 2010. She resigned in June 2013 to stand for a seat in the Australian Senate at the September 2013 federal election, but was unsuccessful.

Sophie Cotsis was appointed to the Legislative Council of the New South Wales Parliament representing the Australian Labor Party in 2010. She filled the casual vacancy created on the resignation of John Della Bosca.

Natasha Maclaren-Jones was elected to the New South Wales Legislative Council in the New South Wales Parliament, representing the Liberal Party in 2011.

Before her election to the State Parliament, she served as State President of the Liberal Party from 2006-2011.

Sarah Mitchell was elected to the Legislative Council of the New South Wales Parliament in 2011, representing the National Party.

Rachael Wallbank is an Accredited Specialist (Family Law – LSNSW) and principal of the legal practice Wallbanks Legal.

Wallbank represented and appeared on behalf of ‘Kevin’ and ‘Jennifer’ at trial in Re Kevin: Validity of Marriage of Transsexual (2001) 28 Fam LR 158 and on appeal in The Attorney-General for the Commonwealth & “Kevin and Jennifer” & Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission [2003] FamCA 94 whereby Australians who experience diversity or difference in sexual formation, including Transsexualism, gained the right to legally marry in their affirmed sex.

Wallbank also acted and appeared for the Applicant Parents in Re Bernadette [2010] FamCA 94; the first case in Australia to authorise Phase 1 Treatment to suspend puberty for an adolescent living with the condition of Transsexualism (as an interim order in 2005) and the first case to challenge the Australian legal regime initiated by Re Alex (2004) FLC 93-175 which requires court authorisation of Phase 1 and 2 Treatments as a precondition to treatment.

Wallbank is a member of the Legal Issues Committee of the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH) and a founding member of the Australian and New Zealand Professional Association for Transgender Health (ANZPATH).

Wallbank has written academically, undertakes lectures and presentations on the subject of the legal and human rights of people who experience diversity or difference in sexual formation and gender expression, especially with regard to Australia, and appears in the media as a public advocate and legal expert on the subject.

Rosemary Hunter is a feminist legal academic who, through her research, writing, leadership and activism has worked to support women in legal and academic careers, as well as to promote more generally women’s equality, women’s access to justice, and justice for women.

Go to ‘Details’ below to read a reflective essay written by Rosemary Hunter for the Trailblazing Women and the Law Project.

Kim Rooney is an Australian barrister and international arbitrator who has been practicing in Asia, based in Hong Kong, since 1990. She is regularly appointed as an arbitrator in international arbitrations involving banking and finance, commercial, corporate, construction and infrastructure, energy, power and resources, infrastructure, investment, IT and technology licensing and trade disputes, and is on the panel of various arbitral institutions.

Since the 1990s, as counsel, Kim has represented clients in a wide range of international banking and finance, commercial, corporate, construction, energy, infrastructure and investment disputes in Asia, Europe and Latin America under the laws of civil and common law jurisdictions and investment treaties.

Kim is the Chair of the Hong Kong Law Reform Commission’s Sub-Committee on Third Party Funding for Arbitration, a member of the Hong Kong Government’s Committee on Provision of Space in the Legal Hub and of its Advisory Committee on Promotion of Arbitration. She is also a member of the Hong Kong Bar Association’s Council and Chair of its Special Committee on International Practice. She writes and speaks regularly about international dispute resolution.

Go to ‘Details’ below to read a reflective essay written by Kim Rooney for the Trailblazing Women and the Law Project.

Roza Sage, a member of the Liberal Party of Australia, was elected to the seat of Blue Mountains in the Legislative Assembly of the New South Wales Parliament in 2011. She was the first woman to hold that seat, but was defeated at the 2015 election.

Eleni Petinos was elected as the Member for Miranda representing the Liberal Party of Australia in the Legislative Assembly of the New South Wales Parliament in 2015.