Women in the South Australian House of Assembly


There have been 42 women in the South Australian House of Assembly since its establishment in 1857. Women have had the right to vote and the right to stand as candidates since 1894.
In 1895, South Australian women became the first state in Australia, and some of the first in the world, to be given the right to vote and stand for election to Parliament. The following year at the 1896 election, the first women in Australia voted. Ironically, South Australia was the last state to elect a female representative, at the 1959 election, when Jessie Cooper and Joyce Steele were elected to the Parliament of South Australia for the Liberal and Country League. Molly Byrne was the first Labor woman in the House at the 1965 election.
Women have been continuously represented in the House since. Steele would also become the first female minister in 1968. Only two women have represented minor parties, these being Heather Southcott for the Democrats in 1982, and Karlene Maywald for the Nationals from 1997 to 2010. Liberal Isobel Redmond in 2009 became the first and only woman to lead a major party in South Australia when she became Leader of the Opposition. Labor's Lyn Breuer from 2010 to 2013 was the first and only female Speaker of the South Australian House of Assembly. South Australia has not had a female Premier or Treasurer.

List of women in the South Australian House of Assembly

Names in bold indicate women who have been appointed as Ministers and Parliamentary Secretaries during their time in Parliament. Names in italics indicate women who were first elected at a by-election. An asterisk indicates that the member also served in the Legislative Council.

Timeline


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AlignBars = early
DateFormat = yyyy
Period = from:1955 till:2025
TimeAxis = orientation:horizontal
ScaleMajor = unit:year increment:5 start:1955
Colors =
id:LP value:blue legend: Liberal & Country League/Liberal Party of Australia
id:AL value:red legend: Australian Labor Party
id:AD value:orange legend: Australian Democrats
id:NP value:teal legend: National Party of Australia
id:ID value:gray legend: Independent
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width:5 align:left fontsize:S shift: anchor:till
barset:MHAs
from:1959 till:1973 color:LP text:"Joyce Steele "
from:1965 till:1979 color:AL text:"Molly Byrne "
from:1977 till:1993 color:LP text:"Jennifer Cashmore "
from:1982 till:1982 color:AD text:"Heather Southcott
from:1982 till:1989 color:AL text:"June Appleby "
from:1982 till:1993 color:AL text:"Susan Lenehan "
from:1985 till:1989 color:AL text:"Di Gayler "
from:1989 till:1993 color:AL text:"Colleen Hutchison "
from:1989 till:2006 color:LP text:"Dorothy Kotz "
from:1993 till:1997 color:LP text:"Julie Greig "
from:1993 till:2006 color:LP text:"Joan Hall "
from:1993 till:2002 color:AL text:"Annette Hurley "
from:1993 till:2010 color:LP text:"Liz Penfold "
from:1993 till:1997 color:LP text:"Lorraine Rosenberg "
from:1994 till:2010 color:AL text:"Lea Stevens "
from:1994 till:2014 color:AL text:"Robyn Geraghty "
from:1994 till:2010 color:AL text:"Trish White "
bar:Bedford
from:1997 till:2017 color:AL text:"
from:2017 till:2019 color:ID text:"Frances Bedford "
barset:MHAs2
from:1997 till:2014 color:AL text:"Lyn Breuer "
from:1997 till:2010 color:AL text:"Vini Ciccarello "
from:1997 till:2018 color:AL text:"Steph Key "
from:1997 till:2010 color:NP text:"Karlene Maywald "
from:1997 till:2018 color:AL text:"Jennifer Rankine "
from:1997 till:2014 color:AL text:"Gay Thompson "
from:2002 till:2019 color:LP text:"Vickie Chapman "
from:2002 till:2010 color:AL text:"Jane Lomax-Smith "
from:2002 till:2018 color:LP text:"Isobel Redmond "
from:2006 till:2014 color:AL text:"Chloë Fox "
from:2006 till:2014 color:AL text:"Grace Portolesi "
from:2006 till:2010 color:AL text:"Lindsay Simmons "
from:2010 till:2019 color:LP text:"Rachel Sanderson "
from:2010 till:2018 color:AL text:"Leesa Vlahos "
from:2012 till:2019 color:AL text:"Zoe Bettison "
from:2012 till:2019 color:AL text:"Susan Close "
from:2014 till:2018 color:AL text:"Annabel Digance "
from:2014 till:2019 color:AL text:"Katrine Hildyard "
from:2014 till:2019 color:AL text:"Dana Wortley "
from:2014 till:2019 color:AL text:"Nat Cook "
from:2018 till:2019 color:LP text:"Carolyn Habib "
from:2018 till:2019 color:LP text:"Paula Luethen "
from:2018 till:2019 color:AL text:"Jayne Stinson "
from:2019 till:2019 color:AL text:"Andrea Michaels "
barset:skip