1983
The Office of the Status of Women was upgraded to a Division and returned to the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet.
The National Wage Case was held. The Australian Conciliation and Arbitration Commission (ACAC) acknowledged women's work was undervalued and underpaid but said the economy could not afford to pay commensurate wages.
Australia ratified the United Nations Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW).
Senator Susan Ryan was the first Labor woman Federal Minister. As the Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Women's Issues, Senator Ryan introduced the Sex Discrimination Act 1984.
1982
The Office of Women's Affairs was renamed the Office of the Status of Women.
1981
The Federal Human Rights Commission Act came into force, based on the United Nations International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
Shirley McKerrow was the first woman president of any political party. Shirley was the National Party of Australia's Federal President for six years from March 1981. Prior to holding that position, she was President of the Victorian National Party.
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1980
Women were admitted to the Surf Life Saving Association of Australia (SLSA). In July, five women form Cottesloe Surf Life Saving Club WA sat the SLSA Bronze Medallion test, to give them equal rights to patrol the surf beaches around Australia and to compete at surf lifesaving carnivals.
1979
The National Women's Advisory Council was established.
Deborah Wardley won the right to be employed as a pilot with Ansett in a case heard by the Victorian Equal Opportunity Board.
The Maternity Leave Test Case decision of the (then) Australian Conciliation and Arbitration Commission granted a 12 month maternity leave entitlement to all permanent workers. The decision guaranteed continuity of employment following leave for the birth of a child.
1976
Justice Elizabeth Evatt was the first woman appointed Chief Justice of the Family Court of Australia.
Pat O'Shane was admitted to the Bar, becoming Australia's first Aboriginal barrister.
Senator Margaret Guilfoyle was the first woman Cabinet Minister in the Commonwealth Parliament. As Minister for Social Security, she was appointed to Cabinet on 8 July 1976.
Joy Mein was the first woman President of a major political party (the Liberal Party, Victorian Branch).
The Women's Affairs Branch in the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet became the Office of Women's Affairs and was subsequently moved to the newly created Department of Home Affairs.
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1975
Women's Affairs Section in the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet was upgraded to the Women's Affairs Branch.
International Women's Year and the start of the International Decade for Women declared by the United Nations. The Federal Government funded a series of conferences on women's issues.
The Federal Family Law Act (subsequently amended in 1983) introduced a no-fault divorce system. Irretrievable breakdown of marriage became the only ground for divorce. Legislative recognition of the economic value of women's traditional work in the home was given in the division of assets on divorce.
The Commonwealth Jury Exemptions Act 1967-75 amended the Jury Act 1967 , giving women equal footing with men for jury service.
The first sex discrimination act in Australia was passed by the South Australian Parliament (the Sex Discrimination Act 1975). It came into operation on 12 August 1976. The legislation was complaints-based, defining indirect discrimination.
The first United Nations World Conference on Women was held in Mexico City.
Senator Margaret Guilfoyle, Liberal Party, becomes the first woman senator to be a member of the cabinet and to administer a government department.
Senator Kathy Martin is appointed Assistant Opposition Whip in the Senate, and later the same year Assistant Government Whip.
1974
Women's Affairs Section, headed by Sara Dowse, was established in the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet.
First Women's Liberation Movement 'Halfway House' refuge for battered women opened in Kew, Victoria.
First National Feminist and Social Conference held (University of Melbourne).
Planned Parenthood Clinic started by the Women's Action Group of Prahan College of Advance Education. The clinic provided advice and general gynaecological, contraception and abortion services.
First Australian survey on migrant working women conducted. The survey was published as A Preliminary Survey of Migrant Women in the Clothing Trade, (Datrina Brown and Des Storer).
1973
Elizabeth Reid was the first Women's Adviser to the Prime Minister; the first such position in the world.
Justice Elizabeth Evatt was the first woman appointed Deputy President of the Arbitration Commission.
Paid Maternity Leave granted for the Commonwealth Public Service.
Federal vote lowered to 18.
1972
The First Women's Liberation Movement Centre opened (Melbourne) and the Women's Action Committee was absorbed into the Women's Liberation Movement.
First of the new wave feminist International Women's Day demonstrations and marches held. This was organised by the International Women's Day Committee, together with the Union of Australian Women and other women's organisations.
Australian Conciliation and Arbitration Commission adopted the principle of 'equal pay for work of equal value'. However it was estimated that only 18 per cent of adult female employees obtained equal pay under this ruling because in most cases females and males worked under different awards. The Commission continued to state that 'the male wage takes account of family considerations and it will not apply to females.'
The Federal Childcare Act 1972 was enacted which provided the first direct Federal Government participation in childcare.
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1970
The Women's Action Committee formed. It was the forerunner to the women's liberation movement and was formed after Zelda D'Aprano chained herself to the Commonwealth building in Melbourne in protest against the continuing adverse decisions on equal pay. Other women at the Arbitration Court later repeated this act.
Senator Ivy Wedgewood chairs one of the first of the Senate's new Legislative and General Purpose Standing Committees, the Health and Welfare Committee. The report concerned an inquiry into handicapped persons in Australia.
1969
The equal pay determination, by the (then) Commonwealth Conciliation and Arbitration Commission, introduced the principle of 'equal pay for work of equal value'.
1968
Senator Ivy Wedgewood, Liberal Party, became the first woman to chair a Senate committee, the Select Committee on Medical and Hospital Costs.
1967
For the first time a woman (other than the Queen of England) was on an Australian currency note. The five-dollar note depicted Caroline Chisholm. This followed lobbying by the Union of Australian Women and other women's organisations.
Changes to the Constitution brought Indigenous Australians under Commonwealth jurisdiction, empowering the Commonwealth to override discriminatory state legislation. The 1967 referendum also amended the Constitution to include Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples in official population counts. Voting was made compulsory for Aboriginal electors in 1983.
1966
The first women were included in South Australian juries.
The bar on married women as permanent employees in the Federal Public Service was abolished.
Senator Annabelle Rankin was the first woman in the Australian Government Ministry with a portfolio - Minister for Housing.
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1965
Dame Roma Mitchell was the first woman Supreme Court Judge in Australia, and later the first Acting Chief Justice.
1963
Commonwealth Women's Bureau was established in the Department of Education.
1962
Dame Roma Mitchell became Australia's first woman Queen's Counsel.
Right to vote in Commonwealth elections was formally extended to Indigenous Australians under an amendment to the Commonwealth Electoral Act.
1959
The Matrimonial Causes Act passed by Federal Parliament (came into force in 1961) was the first Federal legislation to establish a general law in relation to marriage which superseded State legislation. It abolished the double standard regarding adultery and gave the right for separation alone (of five years) as grounds for divorce.
Jessie Cooper the first woman elected to the Legislative Council, South Australian Parliament and was there for nineteen years. However, she did not hold a seat.
Joyce Steele was the first woman Cabinet Minister in the South Australian Parliament and held the seat of Burnside from 1959-70 and Davenport from 1970-72.
1955
The first woman Parliamentarian of the National Party of Australia was Agnes Robertson, of Western Australia, who sat as a Country Party Senator from 1955 until 1962.
1951
Dame Annabelle Rankin was the first woman to hold the position of Government Whip in the Senate and the first woman to hold such a position in any Westminster system Parliament.
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1949-50
Basic Wage Inquiry held. For the first time women's organisations (National Council of Women and the Australian Federation of Business and Professional Clubs) made submissions for equal pay. The female basic wage was established but equal pay was not (it was only 75% of the male wage).
1949
Dame Enid Lyons is the first woman to hold cabinet rank when she became Vice-President of the Executive Council in the Liberal-Country Party coalition ministry of Prime Minister Robert Gordon Menzies.
1948
Margaret McIntyre was the first woman elected to the Tasmanian Parliament. She held the seat of Cornwall.
1947
Senator Annabelle Rankin (Liberal Party) became Opposition Whip in the Senate.
Jessie Street was appointed as the Australian representative to the newly established United Nations Commission on the Status of Women.
Dame Florence Cardell-Oliver was the first woman Cabinet Minister in an Australian Parliament (Western Australia).
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1943
Nellie Ibbot was the first woman Victorian Municipal Mayor (Heidelberg Council), and served on the Council from 1927 to 1950.
Dame Enid Lyons was the first woman to enter the Australian House of Representatives (United Australia Party and later Liberal Party). She was elected to the seat of Darwin (TAS), and served from 1943 to 1951. Dame Enid was also the first woman to become a Cabinet Member, however, held no portfolio. She was the Vice President of the Executive Council from 1949-1951.
Senator Dorothy Tangney was the first woman Senator in Australia (Australian Labor Party, WA) and was there for 26 years. Senator Tangney entered Federal Parliament on the same day as Dame Enid Lyons in 1943.
First Australian Women's Charter Conference organised by the United Nations Association of Women.
1942
Women's Employment Board established by the Federal Government to set wage rates for women in wartime occupations.
1941
Child Endowment Act provided for payment directly to the mother of an allowance for each child after the first under the age of 16 years (five shillings per week).
1938
Annie Praed became the first woman in the Commonwealth to be awarded a Doctorate of Dental Science (University of Sydney).
[See : 1904 and 1906 for additional information on Annie Praed]
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1937
Ivy Weber was the first woman to be elected as a non-party candidate to Parliament (seat of Nunawading, Victoria). She represented the League of Women Electors on a platform of 'Mother, Child, Family, Home and Health'
Dame Mary Gilmore, poet, was awarded an OBE.
1933
Lady Millie Peacock was the first woman elected to the Victorian Parliament. She held the seat of Allendale.
First birth control clinic in Australia set up in Sydney by the Racial Hygiene Association. In 1960 it became the Family Planning Association.
1929
Irene Longman was the first woman elected to the Queensland Parliament. She held the seat of Bulimba.
1928
First International Women's Day Rally held in the Sydney Domain.
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1923
Jury service for women introduced for the first time in Australia (Queensland).
Victorian women achieved the right to stand for State Parliament; it was the last state to do so.
1922
The Country Women's Association was formed.
1921
Edith Cowan was the first woman elected to an Australian Parliament (seat of West Perth, Western Australian State Parliament).
Tasmanian women achieved the right to stand for State Parliament.
1920
Western Australian women achieved the right to stand for State Parliament.
1918
New South Wales women achieved the right to stand for State Parliament.
1915
Queensland women achieved the right to stand for State Parliament.
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1914
The Victorian Local Government Act Amendment Act made Victorian women eligible for election on the same basis as men.
1912
Sarah (Fanny) Durack was the first woman and first Australian to win Olympic Gold (100m Freestyle).
The minimum wage for women's work was set in the First Federal Arbitration Award for Women by Mr Justice Higgins (until 1950 this was usually 54 per cent of the male rate).
1908
Victorian women achieved voting rights for State elections but not the right to stand for State Parliament.
1906
Annie Praed and Margaret Estelle Barnes became the first women to graduate in dentistry from an Australian university. They were in the University of Sydney's inaugural batch of graduands to be awarded the Bachelor of Dental Surgery degree. [See : 1904 and 1938 for additional information on Annie Praed]
1905
Queensland women achieved voting rights for State elections but not the right to stand for State Parliament.
Greta Flos Matilda Grieg became the first woman admitted to the Bar in Australia.
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1904
Annie Praed was the first woman to be awarded Sydney University's short-lived Licentiate in Dental Surgery. [See : 1906 and 1938 for additional information on Annie Praed]
1903
Women from all states were able to vote in Federal elections.
Tasmanian women achieved voting rights for State elections but not the right to stand for State Parliament.
Four women are candidates for the Federal election - Nellie Martel, Mary Ann Moore Bentley and Vida Goldstein for the Senate, and Selina Siggins for the House of Representatives.
1902
The Commonwealth Franchise Act passed, enabling all women (with the exception of Aboriginal women in some States) to sit and vote in elections for the Federal Parliament.
Ada Emily Evans was the first woman to receive a law degree in Australia (Sydney University), but she was unable to practice until 1921, upon the enactment of the NSW Women's Legal Status Act of NSW 1918. Ada Evans proposed and lobbied strongly for the enactment of this legislation.
New South Wales women achieved voting rights for State elections but not the right to stand for State Parliament.
Non-Aboriginal women gained the right to vote in a Federal election.
1901
Western Australian women voted for the first time in a State election.
1900
Women participated in the Olympic Games for the first time in tennis and golf.
1899
Western Australian women achieved voting rights for State elections but not the right to stand for State Parliament.
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1897
First Woman Political Candidate was Catherine Helen Spence. She ran for the National Australasian Convention. She came 22nd out of 33 candidates and was not elected.
1895
Women voted for the first time in an Australian election (South Australian House of Assembly).
National Council of Women of Australia started in Sydney.
1894
South Australian women achieved voting rights for State elections and the right to stand for State Parliament.
1890
Constance Stone was the first woman to be registered as a doctor in Australia.
1889
Australian Women's Suffrage Society formed. Its aims were to educate women and men about women's right to vote and to stand for Parliament.
1888
First women's newspaper - The Dawn – was started by Louisa Lawson (poet, novelist, and mother of Henry Lawson) and employed all female labour (NSW). The first issue was on 15 May 1888. The newspaper continued for 17 years.
1887
Dame Nellie Melba was successful at her operatic debut in Brussells.
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1883
Julia Bella Guerin, BA, became the first woman to graduate from an Australian university, the University of Melbourne. She achieved an MA in 1885.
Victorian Married Women's Property Act allowed Victorian married women to own and dispose of property in their own right.
1880
Women were first admitted to lectures and examinations at an Australian university (University of Melbourne).
1876
University of Adelaide admitted women to its classes.
1871
Young Women's Christian Association (YWCA) started in Victoria (Geelong). Its purpose was to provide opportunities for women to develop their full potential, to express concern for the community in responsible action, and to strive to achieve Peace, Justice and Freedom for all people.