Patrons
In 1978, Quentin Bryce joined the National Women’s Advisory Council, of which she became convenor in 1982. She was the inaugural Director of the Queensland Women’s Information Service from 1984 until 1987. She was appointed Director of the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission, Queensland in 1987 and in 1988 she took up the role of Federal Sex Discrimination Commissioner. Bryce was the founding Chair and CEO of the National Childcare Accreditation Council. She then became the Principal and CEO of The Women’s College at the University of Sydney. She has also chaired the National Breast Cancer Advisory Council. Quentin Bryce graduated from the University of Queensland in 1965, with a Bachelor of Arts and a degree in law. She was one of the first women accepted to the Queensland Bar and returned to the University of Queensland as the first female faculty member of the Law School. She has been granted an Honorary Doctorate of Laws by Macquarie University and the University of Queensland, an Honorary Doctorate of Letters from Charles Stuart University, and finally an Honorary Doctorate of the University, by Griffith University and the Queensland University of Technology. Quentin Bryce was appointed as an Officer of the Order of Australia in 1998. She was made a Companion of the Order of Australia in 2003, in the same year she was invested as a Dame of Grace of the Most Venerable Order of the Hospital of St John of Jerusalem.
Patrons Upon the conclusion of his term as Governor-General, Sir Ninian Stephen was appointed the first Australian Ambassador for the Environment, in which he worked towards a mining ban in Antarctica. In 1991, he became the Chairman of the second strand of the Northern Ireland peace talks. He then moved onto work with the United Nations, as a judge of the International Criminal Tribunals, investigating war crimes in Yugoslavia and Rwanda. Sir Ninian Stephen also headed an Expert Group, investigating the possibilities of trialling former Khmer Rouge leaders. He was a legal advisor to South Africa in their transition from apartheid, joined a Commonwealth mission to Bangladesh and investigated labour conditions in Burma with the International Labour Organisation Sir Ninian Stephen has been the recipient of numerous accolades. He was made a Privy Counsellor in 1979, given the Legion D’Honneur in 1983 and granted a knighthood of the Order of Australia in 1982. He also received a knighthood in the Order of the Garter in 1994.
The Hon. Michael Kirby AC CMG Michael Kirby’s positions have not been limited to the confines of the judiciary. In 1993 he became the Special Representative of the United Nations for Human Rights in Cambodia. He also held the position of President at the International Commission of Jurists from 1995 – 98. He has been a member of the UNAIDS Global Reference Panel on HIV/AIDS and Human Rights since 2004. He was also appointed by the International Labour Organisation as a member of the Commission on Freedom of Association, partaking in a mission to South Africa in 1992 to examine their labour laws. He was also the Chancellor of Macquarie University from 1984 until 1993. He has been the recipient of a variety of honours, including appointment as a Companion of the Order of St Michael and George in 1983 and as a Companion of the Order of Australia in 1991. In the same year he was also awarded the Australian Human Rights Medal. In 1998 he was named Laureate of the UNESCO Prize for Human Rights Education.
The Hon. Elizabeth Evatt AC Elizabeth Evatt became the first female Deputy President of the Commonwealth Conciliation and Arbitration Commission in 1972. She also chaired the Royal Commission on Human Relationships before her appointment as Chief Judge of the Family Court. After leaving the Court, she was appointed President of the Australian Law Reform Commission in 1988, in which year she was also appointed Chancellor of the University of Newcastle. She chaired the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women and in 1995 was the first Australian to be elected to the United Nations Human Rights Committee. A strong advocate of human rights, Elizabeth Evatt was appointed Commissioner of the Australian Human Rights and Equal Opportunities Commission. She has also been a Judge of the World Bank Administrative Tribunal and served as Commissioner of the International Committee of Jurists. Commissioned by the Minister for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Affairs in 1995, the ‘Evatt Review’ paved the way for extensive reform in this complex and controversial area of law. She is currently an Honorary Visiting professor at the University of New South Wales Law School and chairs the board of the Public Interest Advocacy Centre in Sydney. In 1982 she was made an Officer of the Order of Australia, and in 1995 she was granted Australia’s highest civil honour, made a Companion of the Order of Australia.
Professor Mick Dodson AM Professor Mick Dodson is the Director of the National Centre for Indigenous Studies. He is a member of the Yawuru people, the traditional Aboriginal owners of land and waters in the Broome area of the southern Kimberly region of Western Australia. Dodson graduated from Monash University with a Bachelor of Jurisprudence and a Bachelor of Laws. From 1976 until 1981 he worked with the Aboriginal Legal Service, gaining admittance to the Victorian Bar in 1981. Joining the Northern Land Council as a Senior Legal Advisor in 1984, he was made Director of the Council in 1990. From 1993 until 1998, Mick Dodson served as the first Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner with the Human Rights and Equal Opportunities Commission. He was also co-deputy Chair of the Technical Committee for the 1193 International Year of the World’s Indigenous People. He was also Chair of the UN Advisory Group for the Voluntary Fund for the Decade of Indigenous Peoples, also serving for five years as a member of the Board of Trustees of the Voluntary Fund. He participated in the crafting of the Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples which was adopted by the General Assembly in 2007. He is a Professor of Law at the Australian National University and a Director of Dodson, Bauman & Associates Pty Ltd Legal and Anthropological Consultants. In 2005, he was appointed a member of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues. He is a member and current Chairman of the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies and a board member and co-chair of Reconciliation Australia. He has been granted an Honorary Doctorate of Letters from UTS and an Honorary Doctorate of Laws from the University of NSW. In 2009 he was awarded Australian of the Year.
Professor Hilary Charlesworth AM
Hilary Charlesworth was the inaugural President of the Australian and New Zealand Society of International Law from 1997 until 2001. She was co-editor of the Australian Yearbook of International Law. She chaired the Australian Capital Territory inquiry into a bill of rights, culminating in the adoption of the Human Rights Act 2004 (ACT). She was also the 2005 Sir Ninian Stephen Fellow at the Asia-Pacific Centre for Military Law at the University of Melbourne Law School. In 2006, Charlesworth, with Christine Chinken, won the Goler T. Butcher Medal, which is awarded by the American Society of International Law for “outstanding contributions to the development of international human rights law”. She is a Professor of International Law and Human Rights at the ANU College of Law, areas in which her research interest also lies. She has been a Visiting Professor of International Law at Harvard Law School, New York University Global Law School, the University of Oregon and the Université de Paris. She is a Patron of both the ACT Women’s Legal Service and the Victorian Foundation for Survivors of Torture. In 2007, Professor Charlesworth was made a Member of the Order of Australia for her service to international and human rights law.
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