Neville Bonner: from tin shed to parliament house sbs.com.au - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from sbs.com.au Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
“Pale, male, and stale” has been a consistent lament when looking at the roll call of ambassadors from most Western nations. There have been frequent calls to include more women, more people from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds and Indigenous communities, and to avoid plum diplomatic postings becoming havens or rewards for retired politicians.
Building on its long line of work assessing Australia’s diplomatic network, Lowy Institute researchers have now tracked the course of key diplomatic appointments made by the Australian government since 1974 in the Lowy Institute Diplomat Database. Sourcing data from departmental documents, foreign ministers’ archives and other government and secondary sources, this newly compiled map incorporates 4937 data points, identifying all head-of-mission appointments made over the past 47 years. (The conventions for counting diplomats follow the methodology applied in the Institute’s Global Diplomacy Index.)
50 years ago, Neville Bonner became the first Aboriginal member of any Australian Parliament when he was selected to fill a Senate vacancy for Queensland for the Liberal Party. Neville Bonner was then elected in his own right at the 1972, 1974, 1975 and 1980 elections, in a long political career.
50 years ago, Neville Bonner had been working as a bridge carpenter when he was appointed to fill a Senate vacancy, becoming Australia’s first Indigenous Member of Parliament.