Our
Staff
Emma Dawson
Emma Dawson is Executive Director of Per Capita. She has worked as a researcher at Monash University and the University of Melbourne; in policy and public affairs for SBS and Telstra; and as a senior policy adviser in the Rudd and Gillard Governments.
Emma has published reports, articles and opinion pieces on a wide range of public policy issues. She is a regular contributor to Guardian Australia, The Age and The Australian Financial Review, and a frequent guest on various ABC and commercial radio programs nationally. She appears regularly as an expert witness before parliamentary inquiries and often speaks at public events and conferences in Australia and internationally.
Emma is the co-editor, with Professor Janet McCalman, of the collection of essays What happens next? Reconstructing Australia after COVID-19, published by Melbourne University Press in September 2020. She is a Fellow of the Women’s Leadership Institute of Australia and an Adjunct Professor at the UTS Business School.
Sarah McKenzie
Sarah McKenzie previously worked as a Research Associate in Per Capita’s Centre for New Industry. She holds a Bachelor of Laws (Honours) from Victoria University. Prior to working at Per Capita, Sarah worked at the Media Entertainment and Arts Alliance and the Victorian Trades Hall Council, advocating for the rights and welfare of Australian workers.
Dr Margaret McKenzie
Prior to joining Per Capita Margaret held the position of ACTU Economist at the Australian Council of Trade Unions, preparing the submissions to the annual review of the minimum wage. She has held academic positions in Australia and the UK, most recently as lecturer in economics at Deakin University, and as an Honorary Research Fellow at Federation University. She has worked in economic policy in the Australian public service, mainly at the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission.
Her research focuses on empirical aspects of macroeconomics, market failure, regulation and economic policy, working within labour economics and industrial relations, privatisation and outsourcing, technology, industry and trade policy, development, housing, and applied econometrics.
She has a PhD and MSc in economics from Birkbeck College London and a BA (hons) in anthropology from Monash. She is a member of the Executive Committee of the Australian Institute of Employment Rights. She has presented widely in the media, including on regular economic expert panels for The Conversation and The Age / SMH Scope surveys.
Dr May Lam
Dr May Lam has worked in policy, research and strategy for 30 years, with a focus on services for people who are unemployed and disadvantaged in the labour market. After teaching at Melbourne and Monash Universities, she worked for 14 years at Jobs Australia, the national peak body for not-for-profit providers of employment, training and community services, where she was Policy Manager and Deputy CEO. She has also worked for the private company Ingeus in the UK, the Department of Work and Pensions (UK), the Brotherhood of St Laurence, Marist Youth Care, and other organisations, on various projects related to service design, development, procurement, contracting and performance reporting. More recently she has worked for the Vincent Fairfax Family Foundation. Her research, policy and advocacy interests join around the need to reform employment services, choice and voice for service users, service innovation, collective impact, and better ways to use data to inform evaluation, government funding and social investment by philanthropy.
May is currently Chair of Youth Development Australia and was a contributor to its National Youth Commission on Youth Transitions and Unemployment. She has previously been Deputy Chair of the Board of Adult Community and Further Education in Victoria, and Chair of Writers Victoria.
Meredith Eldridge
Over the past 10 years Meredith has held communications roles in the non-profit sector as well as several communications and design agencies. Prior to joining Per Capita Meredith was Communications and Membership Coordinator at Domestic Violence Victoria.
Meredith also holds a Bachelor of Science and has a background in graphic design. She is an alumnus of the Australian Progress Fellowship Program.
Meredith is passionate about fighting inequality and creating a society that values personal wellbeing.
Rebecca Connell
Rebecca is Per Capita’s Media and Communications Manager. Coming from a multidisciplinary background which covers digital and creative media, journalism, AV production, and business management, Rebecca applies her holistic skillset to Per Capita’s online communications strategy, including the development and production of Re:CAP and Burning Platforms podcasts as well as livestreams and webinars.
Rebecca is also the producer of Socially Democratic, the Melbourne based podcast which covers current progressive campaigns and issues by platforming those leading them, which has also featured Per Capita’s Emma Dawson as a guest on a number of episodes.
Research
Fellows
Dr Michael D’Rosario
Michael is an experienced economist/econometrician and interdisciplinary research lead with longstanding associations and experience working with the NFP sector, universities and social impact focused organisations. He has worked in community development in both Australia and Asia. Prior to working with Per Capita, Michael served as a chair at Deakin University, the manager of a large research program/organisation affiliated with the University of Melbourne, the ESG & Impact Advisor to CPA Australia, and as Research, Policy and Communications Advisor to the Victorian Aboriginal Legal Service and the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Legal service. Michael has published extensively in Economics, Data Science journals and led a number of large economic evaluations.
At Per Capita, Michael serves as Senior Fellow – Econometrics, focusing largely on leading economic evaluation, economic modelling, ensemble forecasting and interdisciplinary research projects. Michael has served as a health economist and advisor to a number of refugee, youth and health focused charities, including Anchor, YouthConnexions, DCS, Deaf Connect, Deaf Australia, as well as peak hygiene charity Pinchapoo. In addition to working with Per Capita, Michael advises on the design of courses in Research Methods with a leading Australian university.
Prior to working in the NFP sector Michael worked with PwC, KordaMentha, AusAid, Victoria University and the University of Melbourne. Michael has served on a number of university boards as a Non-Executive Director and Deputy Chair. Michael is a recipient of the LexisNexis/Butterworths Prize, an Australia Endeavour Award, and the Alfred Deakin Medal, AntiPoverty Prize, FINSIA Award, Australian Endeavour Fellowship, and Ian Potter Scholarship. Michael’s doctoral and postdoctoral work in econometrics has focused on the role of innovation in driving job creation, economic development and services access.
Osmond Chiu
Osmond Chiu is the Senior Policy and Research Officer at the Community and Public Sector Union (PSU Group). He previously worked in policy roles in the Australian Public Service.
Osmond is a former Secretary of the NSW Fabians and editor of Challenge Magazine. He has spoken and written about a range of topics including the public service, the future of work, digital rights, social democracy and multiculturalism. His writing has appeared in publications including the Sydney Morning Herald, Guardian Australia, Crikey, Jacobin, Tribune and Meanjin. He tweets @redrabbleroz.
Tanja Kovac
Tanja is a writer and director at communications, leadership and justice consultancy, Kovac & Co.
After a decade of student activism at school and university, Tanja commenced work as a solicitor at Slater & Gordon, working in the firm’s Public Interest Unit, where she was responsible for a number of high profile human rights cases, including the Richmond Secondary College police “baton charge” claims, illegal strip searches and assaults of women by Victoria Police and as part of the team acting for Amnesty International in the case concerning refugees aboard the MV Tampa. Tanja also volunteered in community legal centres providing legal support to victims of the Black Saturday Bushfires.
Tanja has managed several small non-profit organisations in the faith, women’s and human rights sectors, where she was responsible for all aspects of strategic and operational leadership, managing fundraising and advocacy, cause-related marginal seat campaigns and volunteer engagement. But her research, policy, writing and advocacy passion is gender equality.
Most recently she was Chief of Staff to the late Fiona Richardson MP, Australia’s first family violence prevention minister where she was responsible for overseeing Victoria’s strategic family violence prevention and gender equality agenda, including creating the Victoria’s first Gender Equality Strategy.
Tanja is a Director and National-Convenor of EMILY’s List Australia, where she has been instrumental in developing gender based campaign strategies and policy change within the ALP, including setting the affirmative action target for women – 50/50 by 2025. She is also Deputy Chair of the Multicultural Centre for Women’s Health and on the board of Burrinja Arts Centre.
Tanja has extensive experience with print, radio, TV and online media. Her writing has featured in The Age, Daily Telegraph, Crikey, MammaMia and more.
Jordan Guiao
Jordan Guiao is Director of Responsible Technology at the Centre of the Public Square. He is a technology strategy and policy leader striving to create a safer, fairer and more inclusive online experience for all Australians.
Jordan lived and worked at Silicon Valley, bringing home unique insights from the technology capital of the world, and has over 15 years’ of experience as a technology leader including with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, the Special Broadcasting Service, and Network Ten.
He is also the author of ‘Disconnect: why we get pushed to extremes online and how to stop it’ and co-editor of ‘The Public Square Project’ and appears and writes regularly on various media channels.
Our
Board
David Hetherington
David Hetherington is Executive Director of the Public Education Foundation and was the founding Executive Director of Per Capita. He has previously worked at the Institute for Public Policy Research in London and at L.E.K. Consulting in Sydney, Munich and Auckland.
David has written over 100 major reports, book chapters and opinion pieces on Australian public policy. His writing has been published or cited in the Sydney Morning Herald, The Age, The Australian, The Economist, The Guardian, Quartz, The Australian Financial Review, The New Daily and Australian Quarterly. He was the Chair of the People’s Inquiry into Privatisation and a Commissioner of the Inclusive Prosperity Commission.
David has a BA with First Class Honours from UNSW and an MPA with Distinction from the London School of Economics and Political Science.
Jacob Varghese
Jacob Varghese is CEO of social justice law firm Maurice Blackburn.
Jacob first joined Maurice Blackburn in 2002, leaving several years later to work as a political adviser in Canberra before returning to the firm in 2006. He became Maurice Blackburn CEO in 2017.
Jacob is driven by his belief that everyone should be able to access justice and be treated equally. His legal experience includes running complex class actions and overseeing Maurice Blackburn’s social justice practice. Jacob also provided legal input to the firm’s litigation funding business, Claims Funding Australia.
As CEO, Jacob combines his experience as a top litigator with strategic and lateral approaches to legal matters and his broader view of the political landscape. He holds Honours in Laws from the University of Melbourne.
Nareen Young
Professor Nareen Young is one of Australia’s leading and most respected workplace diversity practitioners and thinkers.
Professor for Indigenous Policy at the UTS Jumbunna Institute for Indigenous Education and Research, Nareen leads Jumbunna’s highly innovative Indigenous People and Work Research and Practice Hub.
The only one of its kind internationally, the Hub focuses on robust research and analysis, policy, practice, people and law reform around the workplace experiences of Indigenous people. It collaborates extensively with other organisations in the employment diversity sector, and other UTS faculties, and works with private and public sector organisations.
Nareen sits on the Indigenous Advisory group of National Australia Bank and the Aboriginal Advisory group of Insurance Australia Group.
Influenced by her Indigenous and culturally diverse heritages, Nareen has made a major contribution to awareness and understanding of diversity in Australian business and workplaces and in the wider community. Prior to her work in diversity employment, Nareen was a Trade Union official and sat on the executives of both the ACTU and Unions NSW representing women’s employment interests during this time.
Nareen has led two influential and successful diversity peak bodies. She transformed the Diversity Council Australia (2007-2014) into a flourishing not-for-profit workplace diversity advisor to business, the public sector and industry, providing members with a wealth of knowledge, research and expertise.
At the NSW Working Women’s Centre (1998-2005), funded by state and federal governments as the peak body for women’s employment in NSW, she ensured the Centre was accessible to all women in the state and that it played a significant role in mainstream employment matters. Nareen was nominated for an Australian Human Rights Award and Medal for her work during that time.
She was also Director and Employment Lead at Price Waterhouse Coopers for Indigenous Consulting (2014-2018), and has significant governance experience, having spent a term as Director at Indigenous Business Australia. She currently sits on the boards of Souths Cares, BlakDance, Per Capita and Diversity Arts Australia.
She has received numerous awards and acknowledgements for her work, including the inaugural AFR 100 Women of Influence honour for Diversity, receiving the top honour in that category in 2012. In the same year, she was named by prominent news and lifestyle website Daily Life as one of the 20 most influential female voices in Australia.
Nareen has presented her research nationally and internationally, and is a published researcher. She is also a regular contributor to the public debate about diversity, writing for and speaking to the media.
Graeme Innes
Graeme Innes AM is a lawyer, author, and company director. His autobiography Finding A Way achieved popular acclaim in 2016.
Graeme led the merger of four blindness agencies to form Vision Australia, and chaired the board of that agency.
He is also a Director of:
- The National Disability Insurance Agency;
- The State Insurance Regulatory Authority, regulating workers’ compensation and motor vehicle accident insurance in NSW.
He is the Chancellor of Central Queensland University.
He has been a human rights practitioner for more than 30 years and is a conference presenter and facilitator.
Graeme was a Commissioner at the Australian Human Rights Commission for nine years, responsible for issues relating to disability, race and human rights. In this role, he led work on:
- The ratification by Australia of a UN Convention on the rights of people with disabilities;
- The Same Sex Same Entitlements inquiry;
- Regulations in the areas of accessible buildings and transport;
- Work with industry on TV and movie captions and accessible banking standards; and
- Three inspections of Australia’s immigration detention centres.
Graeme was awarded an AM for his work on the development of the Disability Discrimination Act, was a finalist for Australian of the Year, and, on the international stage, he was a member of the Australian delegation that participated in negotiating the UN Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities. He was awarded Honorary Doctorates by the University of Canberra in 2014, RMIT University in 2016, UNSW in 2017 and Edith Cowan University in 2018, in recognition of his work as a human rights activist.
Peter Lewis
Peter Lewis is the founder and convenor of the Centre of the Public Square. He is also executive director of the progressive strategic communications agency Essential Media and the founder of the collaborative engagement platform Civility.
Peter is one of Australia’s leading public campaigners with more than two decades’ experience in media, politics and communications. He is behind some of Australia’s most successful and innovative campaigns including Every Australian Counts for the NDIS and Never Alone for the Luke Batty Foundation.
He is a regular columnist with Guardian Australia and Fairfax newspapers as well as the author and editor of five books including ‘Webtopia’ and ‘The Public Square Project’.
