Page 956 - Week 03 - Tuesday, 20 March 2012

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Dr Eaton gave a brief synopsis of the junior and senior division finalists and their work. The junior division finalists were Natasha Zivkovic, who wrote “Shadows”; Kate Wagner, who wrote “A Poisonous Affair”; Zoe Horvath, who wrote “Alys”; and Anna Brooks who wrote “Straight From the Heart”. Senior division finalists were “Requiem for the Brave” by Yi Yuan, “Bones” by Sophie Clews, “The Taxidermist” by Erin McCullagh, and “King Lear Unspoken Sonnets,” by Sam Hardwick. The winner from the junior division was Anna Brooks, who won with “Straight From the Heart”, and the senior division winner was Sam Hardwick, with “King Lear Unspoken Sonnets”. Each year the senior division winner is invited back to help pick the short list of stories in the second round of the judging in the succeeding Litlinks writing competition.

Congratulations once again to all the entrants and to the initiative of the Association for the Teaching of English, ACTATE, as well as the sponsors this year, Paperchain Bookstore, the major sponsor of the competition, the Canberra Writing School and contentgroup.

Ms Jaye Radisich

MR SESELJA (Molonglo—Leader of the Opposition) (5.57): I rise today to say a few words about the passing of Jaye Radisich. Jaye Radisich was a Labor member of parliament in the Western Australian parliament, but she was someone I considered a friend, and I would like to pay tribute to her and her 35 years, which she packed very much into, it must be said.

Jaye died on Saturday at 11 am at St John of God Hospital where she had been receiving palliative care. Jaye was an Australian Labor Party member and was in the Western Australian Legislative Assembly from 2001 to 2008 representing the electorate of Swan Hills. Jaye was the youngest woman ever to be elected to the Western Australian parliament.

She was born and raised in Perth. She attended Mount Lawley senior high school, where she was active on the student council and won the belle of the ball class of 1993. Jaye went on to study arts and law at the University of Western Australia. She became involved in student politics while at university and served as a member of the National Union of Students executive and vice-president of the International Union of Socialist Youth.

While at university, she worked two jobs—as a checkout operator at a budget cosmetics chain and a research officer. She was juggling these commitments with the final year of her degree when she won preselection to contest the theoretically safe Liberal seat of Swan Hills as the Labor candidate for the 2001 state election.

Swan Hills was held by a sitting Liberal minister in the Court government, June van de Klashorst. In the lead-up to the poll, there was little sign that she was in any danger of losing the seat. However, the Labor vote increased and Radisich was able to narrowly defeat Ms van de Klashorst with the assistance of Liberals for Forests and One Nation preferences.


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