New South Wales

Professor Tim Flannery
Scientist, writer, thinker

Tim Flannery is one of the world's leading writer-scientists and thinkers and an internationally acclaimed explorer and environmentalist. Sir David Attenborough described him as being in the league of all-time great explorers such as David Livingstone. Tim has shown that human activity is drastically altering Earth's climate and that these changes will have a devastating effect of life on this planet. He wants to mobilise the social and political will to address this problem before it's too late. That's why he wrote an important and provocative book The Weather Makers, which debuted on the New York Times bestseller list and which also won this year's NSW Premier's Book of the Year award. Tim helps us understand the predicament we face, carefully laying out the science and showing us the likely effects of human-induced climate change. But he also offers us hope of a solution to stop and ultimately reverse this trend.

Victoria

Philip Wollen OAM
Philanthropic humanitarian

Through his kindness and generosity, Philip Wollen brings crucial help to many charitable causes and inspires others to share his humanitarian values and ideals. His achievements in the business world mark him as a man of action and he channels this energy into practical outcomes for the causes he champions through the Winsome Constance Kindness Trust. Philip promotes kindness towards all other living beings and strives to enshrine this as a recognisable trait in the Australian character and culture. The measure of his support can be seen in the extraordinary list of organisations the Winsome Constance Kindness Trust supports, benefiting children, animals, the ill, the environment and aspiring youth . Essentially a private man, he seeks no personal publicity but is not afraid to step into the limelight for a just cause.

Queensland

David Conry
YoungCare founder

From supporting his wife through her illness, David Conry recognised the plight of young adults with disabilities being forced to live in aged care nursing home facilities. This is currently the only option for the 6,500 younger Australians who need residential care. David believes that the generation gap results in a lack of social activity for younger residents. Aged care is geared to the needs of frail elderly people, and housing younger people in these facilities contributes to the chronic shortage of beds for the elderly. And so he is doing something about it. Gathering generous support from the business sector for his newly-formed YoungCare Foundation, the entertainment industry, and the Wesley Mission, David is building an innovative apartment complex providing a welcoming environment with outdoor entertainment areas, natural lighting, and separate and communal living areas for young residents. David hopes that the rest of Australia will follow this innovative Queensland example.

South Australia

Professor Terence Tao
Maths genius

Professor Terence Tao is the most outstanding mathematician Australia has ever produced. Born in Adelaide thirty-one years ago, Terence competed in three Mathematics Olympiads from the age of ten, winning bronze, silver, and gold medals against mostly eighteen-year olds. He gained his PhD from Princeton University at twenty and was made a full Professor of Mathematics at twenty-four. The International Congress of Mathematics recently made him the youngest person - and the first Australian - to be awarded the prestigious Fields Medal, the mathematics equivalent of the Nobel Prize. Their citation described him as "a supreme problem-solver whose spectacular work…combines sheer technical power, an other-worldly ingenuity for hitting on new ideas, and a startlingly natural point of view that leaves other mathematicians wondering why no-one saw that before." Terence remains a true blue Australian with a fondness for meat pies, football, cricket, and our easy-going, honest, and relaxed culture.

Western Australia

Professor Barry Marshall and Emeritus Professor Robin Warren
Nobel laureates

Professors Marshall and Warren are joint Nobel laureates for their discovery of the cause of gastritis and peptic ulcer disease. Barry and Robin challenged long held scientific understanding of stomach ulcers in the face of extended opposition and scepticism from the scientific community. Together they transformed our understanding of the cause of stomach ulcers, resulting in a new approach to therapy and new treatments that are simple, cheap, and effective. Not all that long ago, peptic ulcer disease played havoc with people's lives, its sufferers endured chronic and debilitating pain and ran the risk of a life-threatening haemorrhage or ulcer perforation. Now Barry and Robin have already helped millions of people, in Australia and worldwide, and have gone a long way to the disposal of the disease to the dustbins of history. Their contribution to human health, comfort, and productivity is incalculable.

Tasmania

Dr John Tooth
Dementia care pioneer

Picture terrified dementia patients with behavioural problems locked away and under medication in a psychiatric hospital. Then think about these same people being managed with kindness and humanity in home-like surroundings. The difference is due to Dr John Tooth and his work with the Adards Nursing Home. Since 1991, both have become internationally renowned institutions, demonstrating that even the most difficult problems in dementia can be handled in comfortable surroundings provided that there are special design features and well chosen, skilled, and caring staff. When Japan banned the use of physical restraints in dementia units six years ago, they turned to John for advice. Now, as well as his unpaid clinical work, including being on call 24/7, John lectures in Japan, Canada, the USA, and the UK; teaches Japanese professionals who come here for training in his methods; and he has written the definitive textbook on this kind of care.

Australian Capital Territory

Michael Milton OAM
Speed Skier

Michael Milton says that having only one leg is not an obstacle, it's just part of who he is. In April 2006, in France, Michael set a new open Australian speed skiing record, clocking an amazing 213.65km/hr. He is now the fastest Australian skier ever and first person ever with a disability to ski over 200km/hr. His impressive career medal tally of 34 includes six gold medals from five paralympic games, and includes being a champion for children's charities. Michael has been skiing the slopes since he was three and doing it on one leg since he lost the other one to bone cancer when he was nine. His achievements between then and now are truly remarkable. He was a Paralympian at fourteen. At the 2002 Salt Lake Games he won a clean sweep of all four alpine skiing gold medals, and that same year was named World Sportsperson of the Year with a Disability. Michael has overcome his natural shyness to become a talented public speaker. He has achieved at the highest levels and never stops planning to meet the next challenge.

Northern Territory

Dr. Marika
Teacher and linguist

Dr. Marika understood all of the fourteen clan languages of the Rirratjingu people and spoke three of them fluently. She had a long involvement with Indigenous education and was a Director of the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies. Dr Marika worked mostly in primary and adult education and was responsible for planning and delivering numerous orientation, induction, and Yolngu Matha classes for professional teaching staff. Her writings on two-way education are highly respected around Australia . Dr Marika was an expert in this field of work, which is the practice of drawing on two separate domains of knowledge, like a meeting of two bodies of water in a lagoon where salt water and fresh water come together. Dr Marila was also active nationally as a board member of Reconciliation Australia.

Dr Marika passed away in May 2008. Our deepest sympathies are with her family.