Women's History Month 2009

Parliamentary Women

Australian women won the right to vote and to stand for federal parliament in 1902 – but it took another 41 years before the first women took their seats. The story was the same for our six state parliaments. The two territory parliaments, established much later, are interesting exceptions.

The right to vote was only the first step as this included the right to stand for parliament only for the federal parliament. Edith Cowan, the first woman to win a parliamentary seat in Australia, took her place in the Western Australian Legislative Assembly in 1921, just one year after Western Australian women won this right.

There were many barriers, even when the right to stand was won. A South Australian woman even went to the Supreme Court to prove that she was a 'person' so that she could stand for a parliamentary seat. When? In 1959 – 64 years after South Australian suffragists had won the right to vote and to stand for parliament. South Australia produced the first woman to lead a political party – Janine Haines, leader of the Australian democrats 1986–90 and a Senator 1977–90.

By 1955 only 22 women had served as members of Australian parliaments. In 2008 Australia has more than 200 women parliamentarians, including the deputy Prime Minister and a State premier, with several women in senior ministerial positions. Women are however still a minority of Australia’s parliamentary representatives.

Pioneering parliamentary women - Gallery

Check out the amazing women who were the first women in federal, state and territory parliaments. Pioneering parliamentary women

Some reading

Cathy Jenkins, No Ordinary Lives: Pioneering Women in Australian Politics, 2008

Ann Millar, Trust the Women, 1993

Marian Sawer and Marian Simms, A Woman's Place, 1993

Janine Haines, Suffrage to Sufferance, 1992

Womens' History Month - the history

The idea of a focus on the role of women in national history developed in the USA - discover its intriguing story.