Mary Kostakidis

Mary Kostakidis was the first woman appointed to present a national prime time news bulletin in Australia.

She was member of the management team that set up and developed SBS Television in 1980 and went on to present its flagship World News for 20 years, resigning in 2007.

Her board and committee appointments during nearly 3 decades at SBS and subsequently reflect a strong commitment to social justice and interest in the arts.

She is currently a member of the Fred Hollows Foundation Board, the Sydney Theatre Board, the National Library of Australia Council, the ResMed Foundation Board, Chair of the Sydney Peace Foundation and a member of the Australian Institute of Company Directors(NSW).

The Sydney Peace Foundation is a University of Sydney Foundation and its major Partner in Peace is the City of Sydney. Annually it awards Australia's only international prize for peace, the Sydney Peace Prize. Past recipients include Muhammad Yunus, Xanana Gusmao, Mary Robinson, Hanan Ashrawi, Arundhati Roy, Hans Blix, Irene Khan and Patrick Dodson.

In 2009 Kostakidis served on the National Human Rights Consultation Committee chaired by Frank Brennan. The Committee inquired into the adequacy of the protection and promotion of human rights in Australia, holding consultations in metropolitan, rural and remote areas across the country and receiving over 35,000 written submissions. They recommended a raft of measures, the most contentious of which was a Human Rights Act. Human rights education was the measure that had the greatest support of those that took part in the consultation, but the overwhemling majority supported human rights legislation. The four member Committee also included Mick Palmer and Tammy Williams.

From 1997 till 2003 she served on the Advertising Standards Board; in 1993 she was appointed by then Prime Minister Paul Keating to Republican Advisory Committee chaired by Malcolm Turbull; in the early nineties she also served on the Council for the Order of Australia and in 1992 was a founding member of the James Joyce Foundation Board along with Ed Campion and Don Anderson. She has also been an active member of the Kazantzaki society.

Kostakidis has also served as an Ambassador for Beyond Blue and was also a member of the Drug and Alcohol Council, the Breast Cancer Council Advisory Committee and the Constitutional Centenary Foundation.

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