Heather Allen led the CWA of WA’s first rally, now she’s been awarded an Honorary Life Membership

Heather Allen’s fierce determination to improve the lives of rural women has been recognised with a prestigious Country Women’s Association of WA honorary life membership, five years after she led the organisation’s first rally in history. The former Ogilvie farmer, who was CWA of WA president from 2016 to 2019, was bestowed the award at the organisation’s annual State Conference in Perth on July 18 to acknowledge her 45 years of service. Just two people are acknowledged with life membership each year, with this year’s second recipient the well-deserving Gloria Campbell from the CWA of WA’s Yanchep branch. Ms Allen said it was a “complete surprise” to hear her name called out, joking she had “just about dissolved into tears” on the spot before one of her friends from Condingup gave her a hug. She was 30 when she signed up, encouraged by a local Yuna lady called Elsie Wilton. “I had lived in rural WA all of my life, in mining, but farming was so different… it was very isolating,” she said. “If I hadn’t had CWA, I am not sure where I would have found that social outlet. I didn’t do a lot of sports, and it really gave me so much joy.” Mrs Allen joined the Yuna branch in 1977 and attended her first State Conference in 1988, recalling she had admired the then-State president and thought she could “never do something like that”. She was the inaugural president of the Champion Bay branch in 2014, and became State president in 2016. Mrs Allen was nominated by the Walkaway branch, with the CWA of WA board and members agreeing wholeheartedly by vote that she was a worthy recipient of the accolade. The WA Labor Government’s move to close School of the Air, Camp Schools and Moora Residential College to save $41 million in 2018 ignited a fire in a the bellies of Mrs Allen and other passionate rural women involved in the Statewide CWA of WA. Also adding to their fury was Labor’s plan to raid the trust funds of WA’s five agricultural schools. Mrs Allen led the only mass rally in the organisation’s then 95-year history — a loud and demonstration outside WA Parliament on February 13, 2018 to oppose Labor’s cuts to rural education. It was the first time in nearly a century the CWA had chosen a political side, with Labor’s attacks on rural and regional education enough for it to prove the CWA is more than just tea and scones. “This action significantly and positively enhanced the CWA image in the public domain, and achieved its intended aim with the State Government overturning its decision to close Moora Residential College and other residential cuts,” the Walkaway branch’s nomination said. The decision to hold the rally came after a meeting with then-WA Premier Mark McGowan and then-Education Minister Sue Ellery, which Ms Allen said “got absolutely no response”. With baskets full of scones, placards and determination, the ladies stood out the front of State Parliament and demanded the detrimental cuts to regional education be reversed. “We decided this was what we had to do… and it was huge,” Ms Allen said. “We didn’t want to disgrace CWA because of the history, so it was incredibly well planned out.” Ms Allen said she wished she had offered the Labor politicians a scone and quickly withdrawn the basket from their grasp, joking it was “similar to what the government was trying to do”. “I went to school in the country, my children went to school in the country, and so did my grandchildren,” she said. “It was truly amazing to see this group of women placarding.” The huge volume of city-based CWA members that turned out to the rally gave Ms Allen hope that the city-country divide was maybe not so wide after all. “We had so many members supporting us, and we gained so many branches after the rally because we stood up for what we have always advocated for,” she said. She also worked to modernise the organisation’s practices to accommodate digital-savvy new members while including the 2000-plus existing members more comfortable with paper. Born in the Goldfields, Mrs Allen worked in mining, legal and accounting firms and travelled extensively before meeting her husband Peter and moving to his family farm to manage its business finances. She held a number of roles with the CWA of WA, including as a member of its finance group and as State treasurer – leading with progressive ideas as State President in a bid to grow the organisation. Mrs Allen was a member of the Yuna CWA from 1977 to 2013, serving as secretary from 1988 to 1990 and vice president from 1993 to 1995, before taking on the role as president in 1996 to 1998. Later, she took on the Yuna CWA treasurer role for a year from 2001, and later formed the inaugural Champion Bay branch – serving there as president from 2014 to 2015 and again in 2020. When asked what CWA had brought to her life, Ms Allen was quick to answer: “lots”. “I have met so many wonderful people, learned so much, and travelled to three conferences around the world,” she said. Ms Allen said a fair proportion of the Champion Bay branch was made up of former Yuna residents that had retired to Geraldton and surrounds, leaving the Yuna branch young and thriving. The CWA’s first WA branch opened in the Wheatbelt town of Nungarin in 1924 in response to a lack of services in country WA and a need for companionship among rural women. At its peak in the 1960s, the CWA had close to 10,000 WA members.