Senator the Hon George Brandis QC was born in Sydney and grew up in Brisbane. He was educated at the University of Queensland (from which he graduated with first class honours in Arts and Law) and Magdalen College, Oxford, where he obtained a Bachelor of Civil Law and won the Sir Rupert Cross Prize.

On his return from the United Kingdom, Senator Brandis worked as a lawyer at Minter Ellison before going to the Bar in 1985. He established a successful commercial practice specialising in equity and trade practices law. He took silk in 2006. He was for several years a part-time lecturer in Jurisprudence at the University of Queensland Law School.

Senator Brandis was selected to fill a casual Senate vacancy in May 2000, representing the state of Queensland. He was re-elected in 2004 and 2010 and 2016.

Senator Brandis has served as a Minister in the Howard, Abbott and Turnbull governments. He has held the portfolios of Attorney-General and Vice-President of the Executive Council since September 2013. A member of the Liberal Party’s Leadership Group since May 2010, Senator Brandis was appointed Leader of the Government in the Senate in September 2015.

Ben Knight is a senior journalist with the ABC, most recently as a reporter with ‘Four Corners’, where he reported on housing affordability, the drug rehab crisis, and BHP Brazilian dam disaster.

He is a former foreign correspondent, with two postings to Washington and Jerusalem, where he reported from the front lines of the popular revolutions in Egypt and Libya.

He grew up in Mildura, Victoria, where his has strong family roots in the non-profit welfare sector and community development.

He is now based in the ABC’s Melbourne newsroom, and is currently preparing a documentary on the ABC’s historic Ripponlea studios.’

Professor Daryl Higgins commenced as the Director of the Institute of Child Protection Studies in February 2017. His research focuses on public health approaches to protecting children, and child-safe organisational strategies. A registered psychologist, Prof Higgins has been researching child abuse impacts and prevention, family violence and family functioning for 25 years.

Prior to joining ACU, Prof Higgins was the Deputy Director (Research) at the Australian Institute of Family Studies, where he had responsibility for the research program, knowledge translation and exchange functions focusing on issues affecting families in Australia.

Prof Higgins has extensive experience in managing and supervising research, and has led projects looking at child abuse and neglect, child protection, children in out-of-home care, child-safe organisations, family law and allegations of child abuse, disability and family care, welfare reform, family and interpersonal violence, jobless families, past adoption and forced family separation practices, and community development approaches to child and family welfare issues. He has considerable experience in qualitative and quantitative evaluation methodology and frameworks, and a sound knowledge of state and territory policy and service delivery contexts across Australia.

Dr Gemma Carey is an NHMRC Research Fellow and Senior Lecturer with PGSR, UNSW Canberra. Dr Carey has investigated processes of ‘joining up’ within government and between government and non-government organisations. Her current research focused on the implementation of the Australian National Disability Insurance Scheme.

Dr Carey has published over 50 articles on different aspects of public administration and health. Recent books include: ‘Grassroots to Government: Joining-up in Australia’, and ‘Designing and Implementing Public Policy: Cross-sectoral Debates’, ‘Managing and Leading in Inter-agency Settings’

In addition to her academic research, she runs a policy forum – the Power to Persuade (PTP) (an annual symposium and blog). PTP is aimed at improving the relationships between policymakers, academics and the community sector. Running since 2011, PTP is sponsored by the government and a range of NGOs and peak bodies (www.powertopersuade.org.au)

After chairing the working party that established the Logan Together initiative during 2014/2015, Matthew Cox was appointed its Director in July 2015. Prior to this role, Matthew spent a decade at the Australian Red Cross, heading the organisation’s human services and community development program in Queensland.

During that time, Red Cross grew to be a significant provider of homelessness services, child and family support programs, youth development and community development programs, and developed unique collaborative governance models for work in remote Indigenous communities. Matthew has developed particular experience in applying collective impact methodologies in the local context, and has also led numerous place-based, sector integration and collaborative practice projects.

Earlier Matthew had a career in local government and in marketing and communications.  Matthew has four kids and lives in Brisbane.

Ian Law is currently the CEO of RAQ. He has been in Executive Management for over 15 years and has a strong track record in change management and restructuring organisations to achieve ISO Quality Management accreditation leading to increased efficiencies and achieving strategic goals.  As well as being a qualified Social Worker with a PhD in Psychology he spent the early years of his career in child protection and mental health services in both the Government and not-for-profit sector. He trained as a Family Therapist and enjoyed two decades of private practice, teaching and consulting in the UK, Australia, Canada, USA and a number of other countries. His most recent publication, Self Research: The Intersection of Therapy and Research, Routledge 2014, challenges practitioners to evaluate and articulate the politics that underpin their practice.  He is also a member of the CEO Institute and a Graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors.

Information and Communication Technology Systems

RAQ’s technology services include six incoming telephone lines, complemented by webchat and email enquiries via Avaya Aura Contact Centre (AACC). In 2016/2017 we provided information, support and referral, as well as online and telephone mediation and support services to a total of 200,000 incoming calls across the following services:

• the national Telephone Dispute Resolution Service;
• the national Family Relationship Advice Line;
• the 24/7 Victim Counselling and Support Service providing trauma-informed telephone support and referrals;
• the 24/7 Gambling Help Service in Queensland;
• the ACT Gambling Counselling and Support Service (24 hours); and
• a centralised information, referral and booking service for our 20 venues and our four Family Relationship Centres.