The Australian Women's Register

Tamara Smith was elected as the Member for Ballina representing the Greens Party in the Legislative Assembly of the New South Wales Parliament in 2015.

Susanne Elizabeth Schreiner (Sue) was born in Sydney in 1939 of parents who left Vienna before the outbreak of World War II. She spent her early life in Canberra and was in the year of the first graduates (in Law) of the Australian National University (ANU) in 1962. She also completed a Diploma in Criminology from the University of Sydney.

Schreiner signed the High Court roll as a barrister and solicitor in 1962, the same year she was admitted to practise at the NSW Bar. She was the first female barrister to appear in the Supreme Court of the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) and the fourteenth woman admitted to the NSW Bar. She had difficulty gaining articles in NSW and this led to her finally gaining employment as a solicitor in Canberra with Mr J. D. Donohoe. She stayed with him until 1964 when she went to Sydney. She practised at the Bar there until 1975 when she was appointed a NSW Magistrate. She was the second woman appointed as a NSW Magistrate and the first person to be so appointed from outside the Public Service. Her appointment caused great outcry as it heralded a big shift in the way in which NSW Magistrates were appointed.

Schreiner is the co-author (with K.B. Morgan) of ‘Probate practice and precedents’. She did some law reporting as well as research for Butterworth’s into the feasibility of an Australian version of Halsbury’s Laws of England, the existence of which is now a fact.

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

Rosemary Budavari is currently (2016) the Senior Solicitor for Disability Discrimination Law at Canberra Community Law, a position she has held since 2013. She has played an important role in Australian community law services and, in 2010, she was recognised for this role when she was awarded the Medal of the Order of Australia for service to the law through the advancement of human rights and through the Women’s Legal Centre of the ACT.

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

Mary Genevieve Gaudron, born 5 January 1943, was the first female justice of the High Court of Australia, and the only one in the Court’s first 100 years. She was born into outback NSW Moree’s working class railway community adjacent to a camp of dispossessed Aboriginal Australians. Both communities held the status of battlers, somewhat apart from the rich white business community on the other side of the Mehi River. Fittingly, she became one of the High Court justices who decided Eddie Mabo’s landmark case on Aboriginal land rights.

Throughout her career Gaudron, a colourful and lively personality, remained down-to-earth, proud of her working class origins, and humble about her achievements.

On her retirement from the High Court in 2003, Gaudron accepted a part-time appointment on the International Labour Organisation’s Administrative Tribunal in Geneva. She served a term as its President before retiring in 2012 to her Sydney home.

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

The Women Lawyers’ Association of New South Wales was formally established in 1952, making it the first formal association of its kind in Australia. It’s key objectives, as set out in the constitution, were:

• to provide a common meeting ground for women lawyers;
• to foster the growth of a corporate spirit among women lawyers;
• to make suggestions and work for the reform of the law and the administration of the law particularly as affecting women and children;
• to assist with such movements for the advancement of women as the Association may from time to time decide;
• to participate as a body in matters of interest to the legal profession;
• such other objects as the association shall in general meeting from time to time decide.

Nerida Josephine Cohen (later Goodman) was the second woman (and first Jewish woman) to practise at the New South Wales (NSW) Bar. Amongst her early mentors were Professor Gladys Marks and feminist leaders Jessie Street and Ruby Rich. She was admitted to the NSW bar in 1935.

She built her business steadily throughout the 1930s and 40s, particularly in the area of divorce and industrial law, because she had an abiding interest in advancing the rights of women in the domestic and industrial spheres.

During WWII, Nerida left the Bar to play a part in the war effort by working firstly with the Women’s Employment Board and then with the NSW Department of Labour and Industry as a legal officer. She was chairman of the Council for Women in War Work, which collected records of the achievements of women during the war.

In 1952, she was invited to be the inaugural president of the Women Lawyers Association of New South Wales.

In May 1940, when Veronica Pike was admitted as a solicitor, there were very few woman solicitors in New South Wales. A pioneering woman lawyer, Pike was active in the International Federation of Women Lawyers and the Women Lawyers’ Association of New South Wales, of which she was a founding member.

Tanya Davies was elected as the Member for Mulgoa in the Legislative Assembly of the New South Wales Parliament, representing the Liberal Party of Australia, at the 2011 election. She was re-elected in 2015 and became Parliamentary Secretary for Youth Affairs and Homelessness.

Before her election to parliament she served as a Penrith City Councillor from 2008-2012.

Melanie Gibbons was elected Member for Menai in the Legislative Assembly of the New South Wales Parliament, representing the Liberal party of Australia, at the 2011 election. As the result of an electoral redistribution, Gibbons was elected to the new seat of Holsworthy at the 2015 election. She has served as Temporary Speaker since 2011.

Sibyl Enid Vera Munro Morrison became the first female barrister in New South Wales in June 1924. She was often briefed by fellow pioneering female lawyers, Christian Jollie Smith and Marie Byles, to whom she referred as her ‘sisters-in-law’.

Ada Emily Evans began her professional life as a teacher, but later blazed a trail for women in the legal profession. In 1902, at the University of Sydney, she was the first woman in Australia to earn a Bachelor of Laws, graduating at a time when New South Wales law did not allow her to practise. She was admitted to the NSW Bar in 1921 after changes to the legislation, thus becoming the first woman to be admitted to the bar in New South Wales.

Casey Sablowski (nee Eastham) was a member of the gold medal-winning Australian women’s hockey team at the Commonwealth Games in 2014.

Kate Jenner began playing hockey when she was seven years old. She was a member of the gold medal-winning Australian women’s hockey team at the Commonwealth Games in 2014.

Dani Samuels was the youngest member of the Australian athletics team at the Olympic Games in Beijing in 2008. The following year, she became discus world champion. She went on to win a gold medal at the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow in 2014.

Shelley Watts became Australia’s first female boxing champion when she won the gold medal in the lightweight division at the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow in 2014.

Edwina Bone was a member of the gold medal-winning Australian women’s hockey team at the Commonwealth Games in 2014.

Maddison Elliot began swimming when she was just six months old. She was diagnosed with cerebral palsy when she was four. She won five gold medals at the Youth Paralympic Games in 2009 and went on to win further gold medals at the Olympic Games in London in 2012 and the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow in 2014. In 2014, she was awarded a Medal of the Order of Australia for service to sport.

Kellie White began playing hockey when she was four years old. She went on to represent Australia at the Commonwealth Games, the Women’s Hockey World Cup and the Oceania Cup.

In 1985, Margaret Rizkalla was appointed a magistrate in the state of Victoria, the first woman to be appointed to the position. Changes to the appointment criteria, which introduced a Law Degree as a requirement for new appointments in the Victorian Magistrates Act, rather than a progression from the rank of Clerks of Courts, enabled this appointment. Rizkalla graduated with a law degree from the University of Melbourne in 1975 and completed the Leo Cussen Legal Education course as an alternative to completing articles in 1976. She was admitted to practice as a solicitor and barrister in Victoria in 1976.

Rizkalla practised at the Victorian Bar until December 1984, when she was appointed a Member of the Small Claims and Residential Tenancy Tribunal of Victoria. Her appointment to the magistracy occurred in September 1985.

Whilst a sitting magistrate, Rizkalla was also appointed Chair of the Police Disciplinary Board of Victoria. In June 1988, she was appointed President of the Victorian Equal Opportunity Board and Deputy President of the Victorian Administrative Appeals Tribunal.

In June 1994, Rizkalla was appointed a Judge of the County Court of Victoria. She retired from this position in February 2013.

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

Born and raised in the eastern suburbs of Sydney, Gabrielle Upton is a Liberal party Member of the House of Assembly, for the seat of Vaucluse, in the Parliament of New South Wales. On 2 April 2015, she was appointed as Attorney General for New South Wales, having previously held the position of Minister for Family and Community Services between 23 April 2014 until 2 April 2015. Prior to that she served as Minister for Sport and Recreation from August 2013 until April 2014 and Parliamentary Secretary for Tertiary Education and Skills, from May 2011 until August 2013. She was first elected to parliament in 2011.

Debra Mullins is a Judge of the Supreme Court of Queensland, a Trustee of the Sylvia and Charles Viertel Charitable Foundation and the Chancellor of the Anglican Diocese of Brisbane. She is the patron of Justice and the Law Society based at the University of Queensland and a member of the Visiting Committee of the Griffith Law School. She is also extensively involved in judicial education through her work with the National Judicial College of Australia.

Kate Eastman has practised as a barrister in Sydney since 1998. She practises in the areas of human rights, discrimination, employment and public law. Previously, she worked as a solicitor at Allen Allen & Hemsley and as a senior legal officer at the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission. She holds a BA/LLB (UNSW), LLM (UCL London), LLM (UTS) and a Diploma of International Human Rights Law (EUI Italy).

Kate Eastman has been actively involved in a number of human rights and international law organisations. She was a co-founder and president of Australian Lawyers for Human Rights. She has taught human rights/civil liberties and international law at the University of Technology (Sydney) and the University of Sydney, as well as a number of international programs.

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

Louisa Southwell was the founding president of the Hall branch of the Red Cross Society, which was founded in May 1916. She became vice-president in 1917 when Blanche Crace took over the presidency.