COMMUNITY activists for mental health, drought relief and cancer support, and one of Queensland’s most successful philanthropists are finalists for the title of Queensland Australian Senior of the Year to be announced on October 30.
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Charleville woman Nerida Egan, 68, started her charity Aussie Helpers with husband Brian after he spent a year in hospital battling post-traumatic stress as a result of losing the family farm.
A psychologist told Brian to “find somebody worse off than you are and see if you can help them”.
The couple has since helped countless farming families, giving away thousands of tonnes of hay, groceries and gifts and almost $1 million in drought aid. Nerida undertakes the charity’s administration and packs grocery hampers and pamper parcels, as well as lending an ear to families doing it tough.
Brisbane philanthropist Tim Fairfax, 69, is one of the nation’s most successful and generous businessmen.
With pastoral interests in Queensland and NSW he is passionate about supporting rural, remote and regional communities.
As founder of the Tim Fairfax Family Foundation, since 2008 he has gifted more than $16 million to community-based arts, music and sporting projects in regional Australia and also chairs the board of the Vincent Fairfax Family Foundation, which has donated more than $100 million. He is a founding benefactor of the National Portrait Gallery in Canberra, a keen supporter of The Ekka and Chancellor of the Queensland University of Technology.
Philippa Harris, 65, moved to Townsville in 1990 where she was deeply affected by the human rights abuses of people with mental illness at Townsville Hospital.
She determined to humanise mental health and show recovery is possible, and as program co-ordinator of the Mental Illness Fellowship of NQ secured funding for a range of support services offered by the fledgling organisation. She rose to the position of chief executive before stepping down in 2008 to focus on community education, and has delivered mental health education courses to tens of thousands of medical students and others to counter myths and misunderstandings about mental illness.
Col Reynolds, 76, was a tourist coach driver when curiosity made him stop his empty coach and follow two young children with bald heads into Camperdown Children’s Hospital in Sydney.
Touched by their spirit, he made it his mission to help children with cancer, and for almost 10 years he funded day trips and camps for children in the oncology unit.
He later turned his energies to raising money for childhood cancer research and in 1993 founded what became The Kids Cancer Project, which has committed funding of almost $27 million to childhood cancer research.
The winner of the Queensland Senior Australian of the Year will become a finalist in the 2016 Senior Australian of the Year Awards, which will be announced in Canberra on January 25.
Queensland Australian of the Year finalists are journalist Peter Greste, human rights activist Debbie Kilroy, diversity champion Catherine McGregor and humanitarian Lucy Strickland.
