Speakers
- Keynote Speaker: 2011 Australian of The Year Simon Mckeon
- Keynote Speaker: Philippa Taylor CEO Family Business Australia: Renewal In Business and Community Service
- Keynote Speaker: Paul Cleary Author and journalist: Australia’s Debt To East East Timor
Keynote speaker 2011 Australian of The Year Simon Mckeon
Simon McKeon Victorian businessman and philanthropist is the 2011 Australian of the Year.
Mr McKeon is a successful investment banker who dropped back to a part-time role as an executive chairman at Macquarie Group in 1994, to focus on social causes.
His lifelong efforts to support Australian and international charities has earned him great admiration and respect in the community.
"I am just one of a great army of Australians who are involved in the not-for-profit sector," he said.
Mr McKeon used his acceptance speech to urge Australians to volunteer, particularly in the wake of devastating floods across the country.
"We as individuals and as a community need to nurture the not-for-profit sector, which in turn nurtures our nation," he said.
"It's a sector which willingly tackles the unwanted tasks, the tasks that neither business nor government is able to do."
Mr McKeon was previously on the board of World Vision Australia and is chairman of the CSIRO and also Business for Millennium Development, which encourages business to engage with the developing world.
The father of four is also involved with the Global Poverty Project and Red Dust Role Models, which works with remote Indigenous communities, and recently retired as founding chairman of MS Research Australia. He lives with multiple sclerosis on a day to day basis.
Mr McKeon also held the world speed sailing record with crewman Tim Daddo for 11 years.
Keynote Speaker: Philippa Taylor CEO Family Business Australia: Renewal In Business and Community Service
Philippa Taylor, Chief Executive Officer of Family Business Australia, has spent the bulk of her working career as a journalist, initially as a reporter and subsequently as editor of a large community paper with Independent News Limited in South Africa. She held this position for a number of years, and entered the not for profit sector with an internationally renowned South African human rights organization. She assumed a branch leadership position in the organisation, which was committed to democratic rule through universal franchise.
This experience in a non-governmental organization working with a diverse group of people served her well in her role as Chief Executive Officer of Family Business Australia, a national not for profit membership organization dealing with families in business.
Philippa first came to Australia in 2000, for a three year stint, and fell in love with the lifestyle, the people and the country.
Philippa has a special interest in organisational succession planning and renewal.
Keynote Speaker: Paul Cleary Author and journalist: Australia’s Debt To East East Timor
A number of Victorian Rotary Clubs have on-going projects in East Timor. Paul Cleary is eminently suited to background our debt to this tiny nation.
Paul grew up in Sydney's southwest and has worked as a journalist covering economic, social and tax policy for the Sydney Morning Herald and the Financial Review while based in Canberra Press Gallery for ten years.
He lived in Hanoi for two years where he helped to establish the country's first English language daily, while working as a correspondent and studying Vietnamese.
In 2002 he was awarded a Chevening fellowship by the UK Foreign Office for a masters degree in the political economy of development.
After first visiting East Timor in 1997 he was an advisor in the East Timor government's Timor Sea Office from 2003-05, while also travelling extensively around the country and learning Tetum, Portuguese and Brasilian foho.
Paul is the author of numerous papers and articles on East Timor, and has made frequent appearances on radio and television.
His two most recent books are Shakedown: Australia's Grab for Timor Oil, " the inside story of Australia's attempts to bully East Timor out of a promising future in the Timor Sea oil dispute." Paul gives an insider's account of the six years of bruising negotiations between Australia and East Timor that followed the independence ballot. He saw how the Timorese pulled off one of the great David and Goliath feats of the region but then were unable to lay the foundations for a peaceful future.
His second book, The Men Who Came Out Of The Ground: A Gripping Account Of Australia's First Commando Campaign: Timor 1942 was published in October 2010. By February 1942, the Japanese military had invaded the Dutch East Indies as part of their push south. All that stood in their way was a force of 700 Australian commandos and a few hundred Dutch soldiers. After months of skirmishes and attacks on Japanese forces, the Australians faced a major offensive and despite the best efforts of the individual Australian soldiers, were withdrawn at the end of 1942, having prevented an entire Japanese division from taking part in the Papua New Guinea campaign. This account covers their heroic fighting against a superior force, and the support and friendship of the locals, one in ten of whom died while supporting the Australians.The book details the debt Australians owe to the people of East Timor.