Speakers

Judith Charnaud is a Rotarian who has lived in East Timor for the past 14 years, in a very remote area called Oecusse .

This is a small part of East Timor which is not actually attached to East Timor but rather it is situated in Indonesian West Timor! . Judy will speak about plans for a SewAID project in Oecusse (teaching a variety of sewing skills, including school uniforms, dressmaking, school curriculums) and Days for Girls. Women and girls in remote areas lose 5 days of education every month, simply because they lack access to basic hygiene options. Days for Girls gives these days back through sustainable feminine hygiene kits that last for 2-4 years.

Steve is Chairman and co-founder of KODA Capital, a private wealth advice partnership. and Executive Chairman of Prodigy Investment Partners, a multi-boutique funds management incubator.  Steve has worked in wealth management for over 30 years, comencing as an economics graduate at MLC in Perth under the ownership of Lend Lease, then running MLC's advice networks, leading MLC Investments and finally taking over as CEO in 2004. He was appointed to the Group Executive of NAB in 2009 and was Group Executive for MLC and NAB Wealth until 2013. 

Steve is also a founding Director of The Banking and Finance Oath. The Oath is an industry initiative to improve our society by building trust and confidence in the finance industry, by re-asserting the moral and ethical foundation of the industry beyond regulation, compliance and any professional standards, and by broadening expectations and discussion to include ethics, integrity, honesty and trust.

Steve lives in Castlecrag.

Steve Matthews was born in the UK in 1953, migrating to Australia in 1985. At the age of fifty-five, Steve sold his business interests to fulfil a lifetime’s ambition to write. Since then, his acclaimed children’s books have been published in Australia, UK, Canada and the USA. 

‘The Skinny Girl’ is Steve’s first adult novel. Although this is a work of fiction, it is based on interviews, research, published works and other materials. It deals with women's issues, domestic abuse, and adversity.  Like most people, Steve assumed that a victim of abuse was identified by a black eye or broken arm. While the frightening statistics about domestic violence and abuse regularly appear in the media, he learned that there are some statistics that are not recorded.

Steve is donating all of his income from this book, in perpetuity: 50% to the Homicide Victims’ Support Group (Aust) Inc. and 50% to various other organisations that help the victims and families of domestic abuse in many different ways.