The Australian Women's Register

Mahboba Rawi founded the aid organisation, Mahboba’s Promise, in 1998 to assist Afghanistan’s people in rebuilding their lives after two decades of war and oppression.

Terri Richardson is a hard working party member of the Australian Democrats, deeply committed to a just society, and passionate on the subject of Indigenous education. Terri was on the State Executive Committee of the Australian Democrats for nine years, 1989-1998, and continues her connection with the party as Acting Convenor of the Cook Electorate branch. She also contested the following elections on their behalf:
New South Wales Legislative Assembly, Cronulla, 1991
House of Representatives, Cook, 1990, 1993, 1996, 1998
New South Wales, Legislative Council, 1994.

Terri Richardson grew up in the Sutherland Shire and was educated at Oyster Bay Primary School and St George Girls’ High School. She trained as a primary school teacher at the Alexander Mackie College of Advanced Education and taught for 15 years. Subsequently she was a tutor at the Centre for Australian Indigenous Studies at the University of Technology, Sydney. In 2005, still passionate about the education of indigenous children, she was actively involved in the Indigenous Tutorial Assistance Scheme. She was also part way through a Masters of Professional Studies: Aboriginal Studies from the University of New England. She has one daughter.

Yvonne Piddington has run once as a candidate (Liberal Party) for election to the Legislative Assembly. That was in 1999 for the seat of Wallsend. She is active locally, and is a member of the Hunter Regional Development Committee. She has held branch and electorate council office in the Liberal Party. Yvonne Piddington was educated at Hunter Girls’ High School and is a self-employed Floor-covering specialist. She is married.

Nelle Rickie was an activist, and a once only candidate. That was for the Communist Party in the elections for the New South Wales Legislative Assembly seat of Botany in 1925. Nelle was an actress prior to 1914 and jointed the Victorian Socialist Party in 1916, becoming a committee member. She was also a member of the Women’s Socialist league and opposed conscription in the 1917 referendum. She was imprisoned in 1918 for flying the red flag. Nelle Rickie became a delegate to the Melbourne Trades Hall Council from the Theatrical Employees’ Union and was a foundation member of the Melbourne branch of the Communist party of Australia. She was also a member of its central executive in 1924. She moved to New South Wales in 1924 and was associated with the Newcastle Trades and Labour Council and the local Workers Club.

A member of the Australian Labor Party, Deborah O’Neill was elected to the House of Representatives of the Australian Parliament as the Member for Robertson, New South Wales at the federal election, which was held on 21 August 2010. In an earlier bid to enter the New South Wales State Parliament, Deborah O’Neill was uncontested at the ALP preselection New South Wales Legislative Assembly seat of Gosford in 2003. She ran against the Liberal Deputy Leader. Deborah was unsuccessful in her bid losing by 272 votes.

At the time of her campaign, Deborah O’Neill had been resident on the Central Coast for 17 years. As a preselected candidate of the governing party, Deborah was able to lobby Ministers and her election material claimed several funding successes for local projects. She was opposed to overdevelopment on the coast. She taught locally and lectured at the University of Newcastle, as well as running a small business in partnership with her husband, Paul. They have three children.

Pamela Osmond was a once only candidate for parliament. That was in 1973 when she represented the Australia Party in the New South Wales Legislative Assembly election for Wagga. Pamela Osmond campaigned strongly on the paramount importance of environmental controls to ensure that resources were preserved for future generations. On a local level, she described the Wagga saleyards and the Wagga tip as “civic disgraces”. She also stressed that decentralisation was one of the greatest challenges facing Australia, and that the Australia Party believed in the creation of new states.

Ann Overend was living in Leppington in 1999 when she ran in the inner western seat of Marrickville (New South Wales Legislative Assembly) for a newly formed party, the Euthanasia Referendum Party. The purpose of the party was to promote a referendum to allow voters to directly support euthanasia legislation reform. She ran last in a field of 8.

Brenda Padgett is a dedicated Australian Democrat party member who contested the New South Wales Legislative Assembly election for North Shore in 1999 and the Legislative Council in 2003. She joined the Democrats in 1990 and volunteered to work for Elisabeth Kirby, then the Leader of the Democrats in the NSSW Legislative Council. She was appointed to a full time job with Lis Kirby and in 1996 moved to work for Senator Vicki Bourne. She worked as the Northern Metropolitan Regional Organiser on the State Executive of the Australian Democrats, and was involved in all election campaigns, state and federal from 1991. Brenda came to Australia in 1973 and became a naturalised Australian in 1975

Tina Palladinetti is an environmentalist who had lived in Bangor for 17 years at the time of her campaign for the seat of Menai (New South Wales Legislative Assembly, 2003). She was a committee member of the organization People against Nuclear Reactor and had fought against the construction of a second reactor at Lucas Heights. She had a personal interest in radiation danger, having been diagnosed with thyroid cancer. She was a member of Amnesty International, the Wilderness Society, The Australian Conservation Foundation and Greenpeace. Tina Pallandinetti worked as a self employed graphic designer and TAFE teacher.

Karyn Paluzzano was a successful woman ALP candidate in the seat of Penrith. She was first elected to that seat in the New South Wales Legislative Assembly in 2003. She was re-elected in 2007, but resigned from the Parliament on 7 May 2010 as a result of allegations against her of falsely claiming parliamentary allowances and of giving false and misleading evidence to an anti-corruption inquiry.

Prior to this she was a member of the Penrith City Council (1999-2004).

Sheila Lawless migrated to Australia with her husband Lawrence and first child in 1955, one family among the hundreds of thousands of “ten pound poms” who travelled to Australia after the Second World War under the government assisted passage scheme.

Gwen Parry Jones is a dedicated environmentalist who ran for the Australian Greens in the 2003 New South Wales Legislative Assembly election for The Entrance.

Jill Pattinson was a once-only candidate for parliamentary election. That was in the New South Wales Legislative Assembly elections for Albury in 1995. This made her the first woman to nominate for the seat of Albury. In this election she supported the building of a by-pass road, one of the major issues of the campaign. She contested the election in order to boost the vote for her party in the Legislative Council, in which it hoped to win a seat and hold the balance of power.

Jill Pattinson migrated from England in 1981 and settled in the Albury electorate, first at Gerogery, then Howlong, and finally in Albury. While at Howlong she was involved in efforts to stop fluoridation of the town’s water. She has published two small books of poetry. She has two children.

Karen Pender was the Christian Democrat Party candidate in the 2003 elections for the New South Wales Legislative Assembly seat of Granville. She had lived in the electorate for 13 years at the time of her campaign. She was married and had 5 school-age children.
She trained as an occupational therapist and worked in various roles in different areas of Health, but her specialty was occupational rehabilitation. She is an accredited Work Cover Rehabilitation Provider.

A community activist, Patricia Oakman was an ALP candidate in the 1973 elections for the New South Wales Legislative Assembly seat of Clarence. She had better luck in local politics being elected to the Bellingen Shire Council in 1969. She held the position of Shire President from 1971-73 and 1976-80.

Mai Ho arrived in Australia in December 1982 with two small daughters and sixteen dollars. By 1997 she was Mayor of Maribyrnong. Twelve months later her daughter, Tan Le, was voted Young Australian of the Year.

Gabrielle O’Donnell is a well known local government identity who has been a councillor for the City of Ryde from 1995-2008 and Deputy Mayor 1998-1999, 2005. She unsuccessfully attempted to enter the New South Wales Legislative Assembly for Lane Cove in 2003 as an ALP candidate.

Janne Peterson is a dedicated Christian Democratic Party member and multiple candidate:
New South Wales Legislative Assembly, Strathfield by election 1996, 1999
New South Wales Legislative Assembly, Bankstown, 2003
House of Representatives, Sydney, 1996
Senate, NSW, 1998
House of Representatives, Blaxland, 2001,
House of Representatives, Banks, 2004
Canterbury Municipal Council, 1999

Born in a small town on the Upper Nile, Ajak Kwai migrated to Australia in 1999. Founder of the band “Wahida”, she enjoys a reputation as a fine musician with an original sound.

Barri Phatarfod is an active social and political campaigner. She represented the ALP in the 2003 election for the New South Wales Legislative Assembly seat of Bligh. Her campaign was reported in the Sydney Morning Herald several times as upsetting both the sitting member, Clover Moore, and the ALP faithful. Dr Phatarfod maintained that Bligh was a culturally diverse electorate and was not afraid of appearing with workers from the adult entertainment industry which flourished in the electorate. In 2005 she was a council member of the NSW Council for Civil Liberties.

Bharati Phatarfod gained her medical degree (MB BS) from Monash University in 1989 and worked as an Intern at Royal Prince Alfred Hospital NSW. She then took up general practise in Surry Hills in 1990-91. In 1992 she had worked at a MultiCare Medical Centre. She later took up Ayurveda practise and now practises natural therapy. Barri Phatarfod is a republican and in 2002 was Treasurer and the Cross Cultural Relations Forum Convenor of the New South Republic.

Norah O’Kelly and her husband Charles, managed a large block of furnished flats in Darlinghurst for more than twenty years. They were active members of the Liberal Party and took part in many campaigns in parliamentary and local elections. Norah contested the 1962 elections for the New South Wales Legislative Assembly seat of King. Her candidacy seemed to have been motivated by her belief that “every Liberal everywhere should have the right and opportunity of voting for a Liberal”.

Nonja Peters is an historian, anthropologist, museum curator and social researcher whose expertise is transnational migration (forced and voluntary) and resettlement in Australia: ethnicity, sense of place, identity and belonging; immigrant entrepreneurship, racism and the sustainable digital preservation of immigrants’ cultural heritage. She also has a special interest in Dutch maritime, military, migration and mercantile connections with Australia and the South East Asian Region since 1606. She is currently involved in academic, community-based, visual and bilateral research, publications and events in all these areas in Australia and internationally. Nonja is initiator/innovator, researcher and curator of numerous permanent and travelling museums that have been displayed variously in Australia, South Africa, Indonesia and the Netherlands.

In 1962 Valerie Olsen was the Democratic Labor Party candidate in the New South Wales Legislative Assembly election for Vaucluse.

Vanessa O’Meara was a once only candidate for the Legislative Assembly. That was in 1991 as an ALP member for the seat of Northcott, New South Wales. She joined the ALP in 1977 and was educated in Sydney (BA University of New South Wales 1975, Grad. Dip. Lib. 1976, Grad. Dip. Public Sector Management, UTS 1990). Vanessa O’Meara worked at various libraries in Sydney, including the State Library, the Parliamentary Library and the New South Wales Teachers’ Federation. She also worked for the Australian High Commission in London. She joined the ALP in 1977. She has two children.

Dr Hurriyet Babacan was born in Turkey and migrated to Australia at the age of ten. A long and distinguished career has seen her work as an academic, social worker, policy officer, senior public servant, researcher, author and trainer.

Mary Murtagh joined the ALP in 1972 and has held office at branch and electorate level and been an annual conference delegate. She represented them in the 1995 New South Wales Legislative Assembly election for Oxley. She was a member of the Independent Education Union and was its Mid North Coast Branch Secretary from 1991-1994

Mary Murtagh was educated at St Brendan’s Central School, Bankstown and Bethlehem Ladies College, Ashfield. She attended Macquarie University where she obtained an Arts degree and a Dip. Ed. She taught first at St Patrick’s College, Campbelltown, and from 1981, at Paul’s College, Kempsey. Mary and her husband have three children.

A Greens senator and environmental activist, Kerry Nettle first attempted to enter politics in 1999 when she contested the New South Wales Legislative Assembly election for Miranda. In 2001 she was elected as Senator for New South Wales, taking her seat on 1 July 2002. She is an active member of a great many Senate committees and is a member of the Senate Select Committee on the Administration of Indigenous Affairs since 2004.