Community is in Roberta’s DNA. In her formative years growing up in a small, dusty NSW rural town, social justice and developing community capacity was the subject of many dinner table conversations and actions. Roberta had powerful role models in her parents and rich on-ground experience in the value of community members to make a difference. She has developed a passionate belief in the value of working with others, when invited, to find common ground for problem solving. Collaboration is at the core of her approach in everything she does, believing that together we are better and stronger than standing alone. Roberta’s values, including trust, respect, inclusion, honesty and integrity, have underpinned a rich and rewarding experience in community and in community engagement in Victoria and NSW, across all levels of government, in her own consulting business, and the media both locally and in Britain. Most importantly, over the years she has developed her relationships skills: knowing and understanding people in a deeper way providing the knowledge for practical, grassroots growth and development. Roberta strongly believes in her gut reactions and trusts her instincts.
Damien is Investment Manager for the NED Foundation. He is a pioneer of the ethical investment sector in Australia and internationally. After bringing ethical investment to Australia in 1981, he turned the concept on its head by investing in positive social and environmental ventures, rather than just avoiding ventures with negative social and environmental impacts. In 1984 he established and was manager of an Ethical Investment management company and unit trust. This company is now listed on the ASX and is Australia’s largest pure-play ethical investment manager. He has experience as a director of a number of organisations, including a Credit Union, an employee ownership association, Permaculture organisations and other charities.
And, if that is not enough:
He has been founder of a number of other ventures, including a sustainable forestry company and a small business finance company.
Biographical Notes on David Purnell
Born in Sydney, David moved to Canberra as a child with his family straight after WW2 and has spent most of his life there. He has grown up with a changing city, full of many new faces and experiences over the years. This has given him many opportunities for taking action in directions that have been important to him. The population has moved from 15,000 in 1946 to around 500,000 now, and he feels connected with the place and its social milieu.
After school and university David joined the Public Service and spent several years in the Australian Bureau of Statistics before moving to become an administrator at the Australian National University. This led to an appointment with the Australian Vice-Chancellors’ Committee (the precursor of Universities Australia) in the 1970s during the Whitlam era when tertiary education was given a strong boost.
By that time David was an active member of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) and became their national secretary for nine years (1977 to 1986). He travelled widely within Australia and then became part of the international Quaker movement as Clerk of the Friends World Committee.
As David’s commitment to creating a peaceful society grew, he became a consultant on conflict resolution and peace education, taught some school programs, wrote a peace education program with a grant from UNESCO, and helped set up a mediation centre in Canberra. Around that time, he became the national administrator for the United Nations Association of Australia (UNAA), a position which lasted for around 20 years. In 1998 he was awarded the medal of the Order of Australia (OAM) for his peace work.
David continued to work as a mediator, working with Quakers and others on peace and justice issues, preparing briefing documents and submissions on current peace-related issues for the national Quaker peace committee, lobbying politicians, attending numerous conferences and meetings with government officials, academics and NGOs.
David became involved in the Social Developers Network in the 1980s, inspired by Ned Iceton’s vision. This led to his joining the Board of the NED Foundation. He is the Secretary of the Board, and active with the Working Group on Restorative Practice. He has also participated in many SDN workshops.
David is a partner to Christine Larkin (also part of SDN), a father, grandfather and great-grandfather. He enjoys singing in a choir, doing long walks, seeing movies, reading widely, and writing frequently to the local newspaper, The Canberra Times, on many topics. He is a member of the University of the Third Age and attends talks and discussions regularly.
David has a background in archaeology and community development and is married to Jeanette Crew OAM, a Mutthi Mutthi woman from southern NSW.
David is manager of Yarkuwa Indigenous Knowledge Centre Aboriginal Corporation which was established in 2003 as an initiative of the local Aboriginal community in Deniliquin. (www.yarkuwa.org.au)
David and Jeanette also own a small farm near Deniliquin where they are exploring Indigenous agricultural production.
Michael Maher has been an executive and qualified accountant in corporate business and managed numerous small businesses. He has had experience as an officer and platoon commander in the Australian Defence Force, manager of a cooperative restaurant, and an initiating partner, software developer and systems analyst in an IT business. His IT skill sets includes database, Web and graphic design. He is a musician, composer, music developer and book publisher.
Michael has also travelled extensively internationally to further his studies of foreign cultures, much as Ned Iceton, the Foundation’s founder did also. He worked closely with Ned over decades to establish the Foundation, setting up the systems, structures and helping Ned develop the ethos which the Foundation came to embody. Michael lives in Armidale, NSW, and continues to serve the Foundation as Business Manager.
Kath is a Senior Research Fellow at Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia. As Academic Director of PACE from 2013-2021, she led the successful development, implementation and scalability of Macquarie’s Work Integrated Learning Program, PACE (Professional and Community Engagement) in the Faculty of Human Sciences.
With a strong background as a community practitioner, Kath’s extensive portfolio of teaching, research and engagement is grounded in relational approaches with a core focus on reflective and contemplative practices.
She applies her skills and knowledge in facilitating creativity and reflective practice workshops, both nationally and internationally. Kath believes a relational approach is necessary for understanding, living with, and responding to our social-ecological systems. It is an imperative given the increasing dissonance between the rhetoric of power elites, and a growing awareness of social and economic inequities, loss of resilience and societal decline. Collaborative, mixed method approaches, through the lens of systems thinking, work with and for people to find solutions to the endemic social problems we face as a society.
As an action researcher, she believes active participation is critical to acknowledging differing perspectives, generated through dialogue, creativity, and reflection, to facilitate change.
Mary trained as a Registered Nurse and Midwife in Wollongong NSW and worked as a remote area Nursing Sister in Indigenous for 12 years. She moved to the ACT in 1977, becoming a founding member of Tuggeranong Community Service (a regional community service in one of the ACT’s town centre regions, now known as “Communities at Work”), a founding member of the ACT Volunteering Association in 1986, employed by that organisation, now Volunteering ACT, as CEO She was instrumental in establishing the ACT Volunteers in Policing Program.
Mary helped establish Volunteering Australia and served President and as national representative to the International Association of Volunteer Effort, IAVE. She was appointed as Member of the order of Australia, AM, in 2003, for services to Volunteering in Australia. Also, in 2003 nominated for the Ernst and Young Entrepreneur of the Year in the ACT’s Social and Community category. In 2004 she was appointed as an Honorary Ambassador for the ACT and awarded a Centenary medal.
Mary sat on several boards and committees whilst in Canberra, formerly President of ACTCOSS and member of the Board of ACOSS.
In 2004 Mary was elected to ACT Legislative Assembly as the Member for Ginninderra, re-elected in 2008 and 2012, retiring in 2016. During her time as an MLA, she served as the Deputy Speaker, Chair of the Standing Committee on Education, Deputy Chair of the Standing Committee of Public Accounts, Member of the Standing Committee on Justice, and Community Safety. She was also a member of the Select Committee on Regional Development. Mary also chaired and sat in various Select Committees on Estimates, with the most recent being as Deputy Chair of the 2014/15 committee.
Mary worked with the then ACT Attorney to successfully introduce Restorative Practice in the ACT Justice system, with the Education sector to introduce this practice into ACT schools and whole of government to establish Canberra as a Restorative City. She consulted with the University of Canberra in relation to post graduate studies and research in Restorative Practice.
She successful introduced legislation to regulate the Retirement Villages Industry in the ACT and Policy change in Sport and Domestic Animal Welfare. She undertook work to promote positive conversation on End-of-Life Issues in the Assembly and in the community.
In 2016 Mary moved with her husband to Murrays Beach, an environmentally friendly Community Title estate on Lake Macquarie, where they currently reside. She served as Chair of the Murrays Beach first Executive Committee for 3 years.
Collaborating with members of the Law and Business faculty of the University of Newcastle and Vocal, she was a founding member of Newcastle Restorative City project, now incorporated as the Hunter Restorative Community, HRC.
Mary is patron of PAPA, Pets and Positive Ageing. She is a published poet, a mother, grandmother, and great grandmother.
The memorial video is shared here with approval of the family.
John Russell was a long-time friend of Ned Iceton, the founder of the NED Foundation. John was instrumental in Ned initiating the Social Developers’ Network (SDN) Workshops back in the early 1970s, and then became an original member of the NED Interim Board, which planned the NED Foundation for many years prior to its ... Read More, and Watch the Video