SPEAKER BIOGRAPHY
Rachel Nolan is an experienced leader, non executive director and consultant specialising in governance and public policy.
Rachel leads and teaches governance programs for foreign governments (mainly from the South East Asian region) through University of Queensland International Development and she is an Honorary Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at UQ.
Rachel was a Member of the Queensland Parliament for 11 years from 2001, when she was elected as the youngest woman ever. She is a former Minister for Finance, Transport, Natural Resources and the Arts. In those roles she oversaw an historic round of economic reform, jointly leading the successful privatisation of QR National, the Port of Brisbane and Abbot Point Coal Terminal. She was a member of the Queensland Government’s central budgetary organ, the Cabinet Budget Review Committee.
Her policy expertise lies at the interface of the public and private sectors.
Ms Nolan has a diverse set of interests. For five years she owned and ran a café ranked as one of South East Queensland’s best in her hometown of Ipswich and she has traveled extensively, including completing an independent near overland journey from Ireland to Indonesia in 2013/14.