The Australian Women's Register

Jane Power is the eldest daughter (and third of five siblings) of Joan and Ken Mckenna and attended school at Iona Presentation College (where she was a prefect) before studying law at the University of Western Australia; she was admitted to practice in 1984 having completed her Articles at Legal Aid Western Australia. She was the first law graduate of Iona Presentation College. Between 1984 and 2002 she practised mainly in the areas of Family Law and Juvenile Justice in both a full time and part time capacity with Legal Aid and a small private firm. She is married to barrister Tony Power of Francis Burt Chambers and has three adult children.

Jane has always maintained a passion for pro bono and volunteer legal work and has held her practice certificate for this reason continuously since her entry into academia in 2002. She maintains a specific interest in the education of women at both secondary and tertiary level, and served on the school board (as Chair for nine years) of an all-girls school. Her PhD, conferred in December 2015, included Education Law. From 2005 – 2010 she held various positions with the Curriculum Council of Western Australia in relation to writing and marking year 12 exams in Politics and the Law. She is, or has recently been, a member of the following:

• Law Society of Western Australia (LSWA)
• Women Lawyers of Western Australia (WLWA)
• WLWA Gender Bias Taskforce Report Review Committee
• Graduate Recruitment Advisory Group (Convener)
• Law Society’s Graduate and Academic Standards Committee (Deputy Convener)
• Law Society’s Mental Health and Wellbeing Committee
• Law Society’s Francis Burt Law Education Committee
• Australian and New Zealand Education Law Association (ANZELA, Vice President WA Chapter)
• Australian Law Teacher’s Association (ALTA)
• Australian and New Zealand Legal History Association (ANZLHS)

As a member of Women Lawyers of Western Australia Jane was co-convener of Chapter 2 of the Chief Justice’s Gender Bias Report Review 2014 (‘the Review’, published in October 2014), a member of the Standing Committee of the Review and is currently a member of the Review’s Implementation Committee. She is committed to advancing the prospects of women in the law and ensuring a fair and equitable participation in practice. She was nominated for Senior Woman Lawyer of the Year by the WLWA and Woman Lawyer of the Year by the Law Society in 2012.