Carmen Lawrence
Carmen Mary Lawrence ( born March 2, 1948 in Northam, Western Australia ) is an Australian politician.
Biography
Professional and political career in Western Australia
After school she attended from 1965 to 1968 to study psychology at the University of Western Australia, where she graduated with a Bachelor of Science ( B.Sc.). She worked from 1969 to 1979 worked as a research assistant, tutor, part-time lecturer and research psychologist in Perth and Melbourne, before she worked until 1983 tutor and then full-time Lecturer in the School of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at the University of Western Australia. Between 1983 and 1986 she was employed in the research and evaluation department of the Psychiatric Service of the Ministry of Health. In 1993 she graduated from the UWA also a doctorate ( Ph.D.) with distinction.
Carmen Lawrence began her political career when she in 1986 as the candidate of the Australian Labor Party (ALP ) to the deputies of the Legislative Assembly ( Legislative Assembly ) of Western Australia has been selected. Two years later she was appointed in February 1988 by Prime Minister Peter Dowding for education minister in the government of the state. In 1989, she also took over the Office of Aboriginal Affairs.
On February 12, 1990, she was the successor of Dowding himself Premier of Western Australia and Treasury Minister ( Treasurer ) and was the first female prime minister of any state of Australia. She was also Minister for the Civil Service Administration, Women's Affairs, Family, Multicultural, Ethnic and Aboriginal Affairs.
When her party suffered an election defeat in the elections to Legislativersammlung 1993, she lost the premiership on 16 February 1993 Richard Court of the Liberal Party of Australia.
Minister in the Federal Cabinet and retirement from politics
After a short time in the opposition as Treasurer and Secretary of Labor in the shadow cabinet of their party showed up for them the possibility of national policy to participate as they at a by-election ( by- election ) in the constituency Freemantle on 12 March 1994 Members of the Australian house of Representatives was elected. Only two weeks later, she called Prime Minister Paul Keating on March 25, 1994 Health Minister in his cabinet. It seemed only a matter of time before she would be the first Prime Minister of Australia. But from the beginning of their work as health minister to them was under constant criticism of their former political opponents from Western Australia. The state government of her successor Richard Court sat in 1995 a Royal Commission, which soon became a kind of "witch hunt " to destroy her political career, which was seen by many observers as. This Commission was instructed to research whether Lawrence unwarranted abuse of power in connection with the presentation of a petition in Parliament of Western Australia in 1992 had committed perjury in connection with statements against a Penny Easton, who had then committed suicide a few days later. This brought them to the brink of resignation, but it was further supported by Keating. Nevertheless, the affair was probably lost with a reason for the defeat of the ALP in the federal elections of 1996 than this 31 of their 80 seats in the Australian House of Representatives.
Reconciliation, affairs of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander art and women
However, in the subsequent period they belonged between 1996 and 1997 and between 2000 and 2002 opposition leaders ( "Front Bench" ) in Parliament as a shadow minister for reconciliation affairs of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander art and women and was most recently from 2004 to 2005 President of the ALP and in turn not only the first President of the ALP, but turn first female president of a party in Australia.
In 2007, she resigned as MPs from the House of Representatives.
And is currently a high school teacher ( Professorial Fellow ) at the University of Western Australia operates.