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Australia
Further information: Women and Government in Australia

In 1902, Australia became the first country to give some women the vote and allow them to stand for Parliament. This did not apply to Aboriginal Australians, including women, until the amendment of the Electoral Act in 1962. It wasn’t until 1983 that Indigenous people had voting rights entirely equal to white Australians when another amendment made enrollment to vote compulsory, rather than voluntary. 19 years after the Commonwealth Franchise Act was passed, Edith Cowan was elected to Legislative Assembly and became the first woman ever elected in any Australian Parliament. Dorothy Tangney was the first woman elected to the Australian senate in 1946, a seat she held for twenty-five years. In the same year, Dame Enid Lyons became the first woman elected to the House of Representatives. In 1986, Joan Child becomes the first female elected to Speaker of the House of Representatives and held the position for over three years. Of the two major political parties in Australia, the Australian Labor Party (ALP) introduced a 35% quota in 1994 and increased this to 40% in 2002 whereas the Liberal National Party (LNP) currently has no gender-based quotas.

As of May 2018, women comprise approximately 38% of senators and occupy 44 of the 150 seats in the House of Representatives. In the current 45th Parliament, the ALP exceeds their 40% quota and is made up of 44% women and the LNP 21%. At January 1, 2017, Australia was ranked 52 out of 175 countries in terms of women in ministerial positions and 50thout of 190 countries in terms of women in the lower house of Parliament. The report issued by UN Women found 24.1% of, or 7 out of the 29 Australian ministers were women.

2007 was a notable year for women in Australian Parliament. Anna Bligh became Queensland’s first female premier, a position she occupies for five years, and Julia Gilliard MP becomes Deputy Prime Minister. Three years later, Gilliard is elected as Australia’s first female prime minister. Dame Quentin Bryce became the first and only woman appointed to Governor-General, a position that is representative of the Monarch, in 2008 and served until 2014. Christine Milne is the only woman that has been head of a major political party when she was elected leader of the Australian Greens in 2012.

Indigenous people, women in particular, are grossly underrepresented in Australian Parliament. Since Federation in 1901, there have been 40 Indigenous Australians involved in any Parliament (sixteen women) and eight in the Federal Parliament (four women). Following are some notable figures:


 * Carol Martin of Western Australia was the first Indigenous woman elected to any Australian Parliament in 2001 and was subsequently re-elected in 2005 and 2008.


 * Marion Scrygmour of the Northern Territory became the first Aboriginal woman minister in any Australian government in 2002 and became the highest-ranked Indigenous woman in government with her service as Chief Minister of the Northern Territory from 2007-2009.
 * Linda Burney, New South Wales, becomes the first Aboriginal person elected to a State Parliament in 2003 and the first Aboriginal woman elected to the House of Representatives in 2016.
 * Joanna Lindgren occupied a Senate seat for little over a year from 2015.
 * Malarndirri McCarthy was elected to the Northern Territory’s government in 2005 and gained a Senate seat in 2016.
 * The first Aboriginal woman to be elected to Federal Parliament was Nova Peris in 2013 after being selected as a Northern Territory Senate candidate.