Fiona Perry

Never elected, she never stood for public office but Fiona Perry has one of the most recognised and trusted faces in Western Australia. But it’s her fingers that likely saved lives during the Covid pandemic.

As one of WA’s leading Auslan interpreters, and often referred to as the “sign language lady,” Fiona stood beside Premier Mark McGowan, the Minister for Health and various health officials during hundreds of media conferences ensuring the deaf and hard of hearing community received vital and real time information about the pandemic and introduced a whole new way of communicating to a main stream audience.

In doing so, Fiona reinforced the critical need for people with hearing disability to be included in the communication especially during a crisis. In the process “the sign language lady” became a reluctant star. Regularly stopped by people in the street, in restaurants and shops. 

Fiona is not deaf but her high profile during the pandemic sparked a renewed interest in Auslan taking it even further than the hearing- impaired community.

Tim Heffernan

Tim Heffernan is Deputy Commissioner with The Mental Health Commission of NSW. An experienced peer worker, Tim was a past chair of Being (NSW Consumer Advisory Group) and the NSW Public Mental Health Consumer Workers Committee. He is co-Chair of the National Mental Health Commission’s Stigma and Discrimination Reduction Strategy and was Deputy co-chair of the Peer Workforce Development Guidelines Steering Committee. Tim worked as Mental Health Peer Coordinator with the South Eastern NSW PHN from 2017 until June 2022.

Professor Pat Dudgeon

Pat Dudgeon is from the Bardi people in Western Australia. She is a psychologist and professor at the Poche Centre for Aboriginal Health and the School of Indigenous Studies at UWA. Her area of research includes Indigenous social and emotional wellbeing and suicide prevention. 

She is the director of the Centre of Best Practice in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Suicide Prevention at UWA. She is also the lead chief investigator of a national research project, Transforming Indigenous Mental Health and Wellbeing that aims to develop approaches to Indigenous mental health services that promote cultural values and strengths as well as empowering users. She has many publications in Indigenous mental health, in particular, the Working Together Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Mental Health and Wellbeing Principals and Practice 2014.

Jo Williams

Joe Williams is a Wiradjuri, 1st Nations Aboriginal man born in Cowra, raised in Wagga NSW having lived a 15 year span as a professional sports person. Joe played in the National Rugby League for South Sydney Rabbitohs, Penrith Panthers and Canterbury Bulldogs before switching to professional Boxing in 2009. As a boxer Joe was a 2x WBF World Jnr Welterweight champion and also won the WBC Asia Continental Title. 

Although forging a successful professional sporting career, Joe battled the majority of his life with suicidal ideation and Bi Polar Disorder. After a suicide attempt in 2012, Joe felt his purpose was to help people who struggle with mental health & wellbeing. 

Joe is an author, having contributed to multiple books as well as his own autobiography titled Defying The Enemy Within. Joe was also named as finalist for the courage award in the 2017 National Indigenous Human Rights Awards & 2018 was awarded the Suicide Prevention Australia Life Award for his work in communities across the country. In 2019 Joe was awarded Australia’s highest honour in the Mental Health field, announced as a co winner of the National Mental Health Prize presented by the Australian Prime Minister. Since founding the organisation The Enemy Within in 2014, Joe has delivered wellbeing programs to over 200 communities across Australia, & multiple countries around the globe; which aims to alleviate the mental & traumatic distress of individuals from all pockets of the community. Joe is also an Adjunct Associate Professor at the School of Psychology at the University of Queensland

Dr Tracy Westerman AM

Dr Tracy Westerman AM is a proud Nyamal woman from the Pilbara in Western Australia. She has long been considered a critical thought leader in Aboriginal mental health, suicide prevention and cultural competency. In 2003, she became the first Aboriginal person to complete a combined Masters & PhD in Clinical Psychology. Dr Westerman is a widely sought-after keynote speaker delivering to over 80 national conferences and internationally in Canada (2003); the USA (2004), Auckland (2006, 2007) and Wellington (2009). More than 40,000 individuals have attended her workshops arguably making her the most in demand trainer in Australia. She has developed multiple unique psychometric tests enabling the identification of Aboriginal people at suicide and mental health risk and which ensure measured cultural competency improvements. Regularly sought out by all forms of media for her opinions, Dr Westerman is also published in many academic journals. In 2018 she launched the Dr Tracy Westerman Indigenous Psychology Scholarship Program to address the unacceptable rates of Indigenous child suicide by increasing the number of Indigenous Psychologists in our highest risk Indigenous communities. She launched the charity, The Westerman Jilya Institute for Indigenous Mental Health in 2020 to drive Indigenous mental health, suicide prevention best practice. Jilya now supports 41 Indigenous psychology students via private donations, fundraising, and government commitments. She has recently signed with UQP to publish her memoir in 2023 which will document her significant, ground breaking work. Her most notable awards include:

• Australian Psychological Society Almetrics Award for the published paper with the highest global reach for the paper ‘Culture-Bound Syndromes in Aboriginal People’, 2022
• Order of Australia (AM), 2021
• Telstra Women’s Business Award, Small Business Category Winner 2020
• Australian of the Year (WA) 2018
• Curtin University Lifetime Achievement Award 2018
• Inducted into the WA Women’s Hall of Fame 2018
• 40 under 40 Business Leaders Strategic Alliance Award
• Suicide Prevention Australia Award for Emerging Researcher 2006
• Mark Liveris Award, Curtin University, Health Sciences for best Oral Presentation of PhD 2002

Shanna Whan

Shanna Whan is the rural woman, founder, CEO, and face behind Sober In The Country (SITC). She is an Australian of the Year recipient (Local Hero, 2022) who decided to ''do what she could to be part of the change'' after overcoming her own lifelong battle with trauma-linked alcohol addiction and almost losing her own life in 2015. Today, SITC is a nationally respected grassroots organisation changing and saving lives and preventing generational harm. Far from being anti-alcohol; the charity focuses on straight talk, peer support, social inclusion, and the #OK2SAYNO movement. Shanna lives in rural north west NSW with her husband Tim.