Julia Gillard is the only woman to serve as Australia’s Prime Minister and received worldwide attention for her speech in Parliament on the treatment of women in professional and public life. She is the Inaugural Chair of the Global Institute for Women’s Leadership at King’s College, London, working towards a world in which women of all backgrounds have fair and equal access to leadership.

Speakers: 

Julia Gillard’s career has been dedicated to improving access to quality education and healthcare, and empowering women to take up positions of leadership across all areas of society. She has written two books about women in leadership and a life in public service, as the first woman to serve as Deputy Prime Minister and Prime Minister in Australia.  Julia is Patron of the Campaign for Female Education (CAMFED). She is the Inaugural Chair of the Global Institute for Women’s Leadership at King’s College London and Chair of Beyond Blue, a mental health charity in Australia. In 2017, she was awarded a Companion of the Order of Australia for services to economic and social development in Australia. She was named one of BBC’s 100 Women in 2018.  Julia hosts a podcast about the lives and stories of global leaders – both women and men – from business, media, sports and politics. Her memoir My Story was published in 2014 and in 2020, she published her second book, Women and Leadership: Real Lives, Real Lessons, which she co-authored with Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala. 

Cianne Jones is a committed Gender Equality Advocate, Lawyer and Guest Lecturer on Gender and International Human Rights at Corpus Christi College Cambridge. Cianne is currently a PhD candidate at UCL researching policing of black communities with a specific focus on violence against women and girls and the metropolitan police force. Cianne is the Founder of Women in Leadership, a grassroots, female led, feminist organisation in Uganda that is tackling inequality and supporting rural women and girls to access their human rights. 

Raakhi Shah has over 17 years’ experience in international development having worked at Unicef UK and Oxfam covering fundraising, communications, advocacy and campaign initiatives. She has worked with high-level supporters to lobby for change at the G8, G20, Downing Street and African Union, and has led over 30 field visits including to Bangladesh, Lebanon, Jordan, Philippines, Pakistan, India, Malawi and more, bringing the voices of those with lived experience to the forefront. She is also a trustee for Reclaim, a youth leadership and social change organisation in the UK. 

Zahra Joya is and Afghan journalist and founder of Rukhshana Media. She has been working as a journalist in Afghanistan since 2011. She has worked on women’s and children’s stories and has also written investigative reports. Zahra Joya was evacuated to Britain in August 2021 after the fall of Afghanistan. She managed Rukhshann Media for a year from her room at a Hotel in London. In 2022, Time magazine chose Zahra Joya as one of the 12 Women of the Year because of her work. She was named one of the 100 women of BBC 2022. She has received the Freedom of Expression Award from the city of Valencia, Spain, and the Changemaker Award from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Rukhshana Media is a women-led news organization established in November 2020 to cover women’s issues in Afghanistan. Rukhshana Media has been named after a young woman, Rukhshana, who was stoned to death by the Taliban in 2015. Rukhshana Media tells the story of women from across Afghanistan, from their concerns at home and their role and position in society. We are publishing in two languages, Persian and English, covering Afghan women’s issues inside and outside of Afghanistan.

Host:

Lucy Siegle is a journalist, broadcaster and author specialising in matters around climate, the environment and nature. As a reporter on BBC1’s The One Show, follows the problem of single use plastic and wider ecological issue. Her book, Turning the Tide on Plastic: How Humanity (and you) Can Make Our Globe Clean Again was published in 2018. Lucy is also known as an authority on the environmental and social footprint of the global fashion industry, her book ‘To Die For: Is Fashion Wearing out the World’ was the basis for hit Netflix documentary, ‘The True Cost’, for which Lucy was co-executive producer. Lucy co-hosts the popular podcast ‘ So Hot Right Now’ (Sony Music) and  has interviewed many natural world heroes. From 2004 to 2018, she wrote a weekly Ethical Living column in the Observer Magazine and founded the paper’s Ethical Awards. She regularly contributes to major newspapers including The Times, The Guardian and The Observer. In September 2020, Lucy was announced as head judge for Our Planet, the first dedicated power list devoted to acknowledging women making a significant positive contribution to the environment or sustainability of the planet. She is a trustee for the environmental NGO, Surfers Against Sewage (SAS), an ambassador for women’s rights NGO, The Circle, and chair of the Real Circularity Coalition.

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