Global Cultural Diversity Conference Proceedings, Sydney
Biographical profiles of speakers and chairs (continued)
Ms Imelda Roche AO
President, Nutri-Metics International Holdings Pty Ltd, Australia.
Ms Roche is the President of Nutri-Metics International Holdings Pty Ltd, a group spanning over 20 countries. Her leadership and performance in the direct selling industry is recognised locally and internationally. In 1986 Ms Roche was awarded the Australian Pursuit of Excellence Award and in September 1993 she was appointed Chairman of the World Federation of Direct Selling Associations. Ms Roche has been involved in a variety of boards and committees. Prominent among these is her appointment to the APEC Pacific Business Forum by the Australian Government and the Sydney Organising Committee for the Olympic Games. In recognition of her contribution to business and commerce, women's affairs and the community, Ms Roche was appointed an Officer in the General Division of the Order of Australia in 1995.
Senator Jim Short
Shadow Minister for Immigration and Shadow Minister Assisting the Leader of the Opposition on Multicultural Affairs, Australia.
Senator Short was first elected a Liberal Senator for Victoria in 1984. From 1975 to 1980 he was the Federal Member for Ballarat in the House of Representatives. He was appointed Shadow Minister for Immigration and Ethnic Affairs and Shadow Minister Assisting the Leader of the Opposition on Multicultural Affairs in April 1993. Senator Short has previously held the shadow portfolios of Finance and Home Affairs. Before entering Parliament Senator Short's working career was mainly spent with the Federal Treasury. He was Private Secretary to two Treasurers and for more than three years was Australia's Economic and Financial Representative to Britain and Europe. Between 1981 and 1984 Senator Short was Chief Economist and General Manager Corporate Affairs, ACI International Ltd.
Mr Jim Sinclair
President, Congress of Aboriginal Peoples, Canada.
Mr Sinclair is Cree and as part of his efforts helped reorganise the Metis Society of Saskatchewan. The Metis Society used community organising and confrontation politics to motivate the Metis to become involved. The Society later became the Association of Metis and Non-Status Indians of Saskatchewan (AMNSIS), and also promoted Metis culture and drawing. Mr Sinclair's drive for Metis and Non-Status Indian self-reliance resulted in the founding of the Gabriel Dumont Institute, the educational arm of AMNSIS. It later became affiliated with the University of Regina. In 1981, Mr Sinclair became Chairman of the Constitution Committee for the Native Council of Canada. When the Metis National Council withdrew from the Native Council of Canada in 1983, Mr Sinclair was the principal spokesperson for the Metis at four First Ministers' Conferences.
Dr Tove Skutnabb-Kangas
Guest Researcher, Roskilde University, Denmark and Reader in Minority Education and Linguistic Human Rights, University of Ostrobothnia, Finland.
Dr Skutnabb-Kangas has been a guest researcher at the Roskilde University, Denmark since 1979 as well as holding her present position at the University of Ostrobothnia, Finland. Dr Skutnabb-Kangas has worked in the areas of bilingualism, minority education, linguistic human rights, linguistic imperialism, minority women and power, ethnic identity, integration and linguistic forms of racism. She has published extensively, around 300 articles and some 20 books, on these topics. Dr Skutnabb-Kangas has served on a variety of boards and been the initiator, organiser and chairperson for numerous Finnish, Swedish, Nordic, multilateral and international conferences and symposia. These include the First Nordic Conference on Bilingualism (1976) and the First Scandinavian-German Conference on the Language of Immigrant Workers and their Children (1978).
Ms Marion Smith
Director, The Pacific Island Chamber of Commerce, New Zealand
Ms Smith is the Director of the Pacific Island Chamber of Commerce, a nationwide chamber whose focus is on developing trade for the Pacific Island people living in New Zealand as well as linking into trade opportunities with their original home islands. Ms Smith was involved in the development of the racial harassment program initiated by the New Zealand Justice Department. She was appointed to the Complaints Tribunal of the Human Rights Commission in 1994. Ms Smith is currently researching a PhD on "Cross Cultural Training for Cross Cultural Trading".
Dr Ann Summers AO (Chair)
Editor, the Good Weekend, Australia.
Dr Summers is editor of the Good Weekend, the colour magazine published each Saturday in the Sydney Morning Herald and the Age newspapers and read by over 2.5 million Australians. Dr Summers has been a political consultant to Prime Minister Keating and in 1986 was Executive Director of the Office of the Status of Women within the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet. She was Editor-at-Large for Lang Communications Inc. and Editor-in-Chief of Ms magazine. In 1988 Dr Summers and her business partner raised the capital to purchase Ms, completing the second only women-led management buyout in US corporate history. Dr Summers is the author of three books, including the best-selling feminist history of Australia, Damned Whores and God's Police which was reissued with significant new material in 1994 after 19 years of being continuously in print.
Mr Nobuo Tateisi
Vice Chairman, OMRON Corporation, Japan.
Mr Tateisi is the Vice Chairman of the OMRON Corporation, a position he has held since 1987. OMRON is a large electronics company owned by his family, which Mr Tateisi joined in 1959. Mr Tateisi is the Deputy Chair of the Council for Better Corporate Citizenship in Japan. He is also the Japanese Representative on the APEC Pacific Business Forum. Mr Tateisi holds a number of board and committee positions, including Chairman of the Japan Music Centre, Acting Chairman of the Committee on Quality of Life and Consumer Affairs, Japan Federation of Economic Organisations and Vice Chairman of the Committee of North America-Japan Relations, Japan Association of Corporate Executives.
Dr Andrew Theophanous
Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister and to the Minister for Human Services and Health, Australia.
Dr Theophanous was first elected to the Parliament in 1980. His current position is Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister and to the Minister for Human Services and Health. In 1994 Dr Theophanous undertook public consultations with community groups on the issue of access to and the equitable delivery of government services for people from non-English speaking backgrounds. The results of the consultations were reported to the appropriate ministers and their departments and actions are being undertaken to improve the delivery of government services to non-English speaking background people. Before entering Parliament he was a lecturer in politics and social theory at Melbourne University. Dr Theophanous is the author of a number of books, most recently on the issue of social justice.
Professor Trang Thomas
Chairperson, Victorian Ethnic Affairs Commission, Australia
Professor Thomas is the Chairperson of the Victorian Ethnic Affairs Commission. She left Vietnam in 1964 on a scholarship to study in Australia. She excelled academically in Australia, as she did in Vietnam. In 1991 Professor Thomas became the first woman professor at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology. She is well known as an expert in the psychology of ageing, especially in relation to the quality of life for elderly people. Professor Thomas has published widely, most recently on the settlement of Vietnamese elderly migrants in Australia and the satisfaction of elderly people living in long-term care residences. Last year, in her role with the Ethnic Affairs Commission, she convened peace talks between Melbourne's Greek and Slavic Macedonian communities after a spate of arson attempts and vandalism.
The Hon. Robert Tickner MP
Minister for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Affairs and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Aboriginal Reconciliation, Australia.
Mr Tickner was first elected to Parliament in 1984. He became the Minister for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Affairs in 1990 and subsequently was appointed the Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Aboriginal Reconciliation. As a Member of Parliament he has served on a variety of government and party committees. Before entering Parliament Mr Tickner held the positions of Principal Solicitor for the Aboriginal Legal Service and lecturer at the New South Wales Institute of Technology. He was an alderman with the Sydney City Council from 1977 to 1984.
Ms Kathleen Townsend (Chair)
Executive Director, Office of the Status of Women, Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet, Australia.
Ms Townsend took up the position as Executive Director of the Office of the Status of Women in the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet in October 1994. Previously she had worked as a consultant on human rights in the office of the Attorney-General, providing advice on the Sex, Race and Disability Discrimination Acts and the Privacy Act. Ms Townsend has worked in Pakistan as a consultant on women in development issues and in Malaysia as an Australian Volunteer Abroad. She is a former Deputy Chair of the National Executive of Community Aid Abroad. She has written a number of publications including Issues on Australia's Doorstep, a development education handbook for schools.
Councillor Henry Tsang OAM
Deputy Lord Mayor, City of Sydney, Australia.
Mr Tsang was elected to the Council of the City of Sydney and to the office of Deputy Lord Mayor in 1991. He is a principal of Tsang and Lee architectural practice. He has participated in ethnic community organisations over the years and served as Vice-Chairman and, subsequently, Senior Vice-Chairman of the Ethnic Communities' Council of New South Wales from 1984 to 1990. Mr Tsang is currently a member of the National Multicultural Advisory Council, the Board of Sydney Convention and Visitors Bureau, Tourism Task Force and the Director's Management Committee of the City of Sydney Cultural Council. He is also a Trustee of the Australian Nursing Homes Foundation.
Ms Meraia Taufa Vakatale
Minister for Education, Women, Culture, Science and Technology, Fiji.
Ms Vakatale was the first woman elected to Parliament to be appointed to Cabinet, in June 1992. She is currently the Minister for Education, Women, Culture, Science and Technology and acted as Prime Minister and Minister for Foreign Affairs in April to May 1994, becoming the first woman to act as Prime Minister. Before being elected to Parliament, Ms Vakatale was the Permanent Secretary to a variety of ministries including Employment and Industrial Relations, Prime Minister's Office and Foreign Affairs, among others. She was the Deputy High Commissioner to the United Kingdom from 1980 to 1982. Ms Vakatale is a trained teacher and was promoted to principal in 1973.
The Hon. Mick Young AO
Chair, National Multicultural Advisory Council, Australia.
Mr Young is the Chair of the National Multicultural Advisory Council. The role of the Council is to advise the Government on how to advance multicultural policies into the 21st century, and on the cultural diversity dimension of the Centenary of Federation in 2001 and the Sydney 2000 Olympics. Mr Young was sworn in as Special Minister of State, Vice President of the Executive Council and Leader of the House in 1983. He was elected National President of the Australian Labour Party in 1986, and the following year he was appointed Minister for Immigration and Ethnic Affairs and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Multicultural Affairs. Since resigning from Parliament in 1988, Mr Young has been a consultant on government relations and the President of the South Australian Soccer Federation.
Emeritus Professor Jerzy Zubrzycki AO CBE
Department of Sociology, Australian National University, Australia.
Professor Zubrzycki was appointed as a Research Fellow in Demography at the Australian National University in 1955. He subsequently became the Foundation Professor of Sociology at the Australian National University. Professor Zubrzycki has published widely in the area of ethnic relations and served as an adviser on ethnic affairs to Australian governments between 1968 and 1986. He is a member of the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences at the Vatican City.
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