Iola Mathews OAM is an author, co-founder of the Women’s Electoral Lobby, and a former journalist at The Age. Later she worked at the ACTU as an industrial officer and advocate, specialising in women’s employment, and was the advocate in the parental leave case, and equal pay cases for child care workers and clerical workers. She is the author of several books, including My Mother, My Writing and Me: A Memoir; Chequered Lives: John Barton Hack and Stephen Hack and the Early Days of South Australia; and Winning for Women: A Personal Story.