A seat at the table for the north

As you enter UCRH one of the first things you see is the Liz Rummery Lecture Theatre. The name on the wall has become familiar to staff and students though the story behind it is less well known.

When the opportunity arose to establish a University Department of Rural Health in the Northern Rivers, Liz Rummery was Chair of the Northern Rivers Area Health Service and a member of the Southern Cross University Council. She recognised what the opportunity could mean for the region.

“I jumped immediately when I saw it,” she recalls. “I thought, right, we’re going to get ownership of this.”

Working alongside public health researcher Professor John Beard and key partners from health, higher education and local government, Liz helped drive the submission that would ultimately lead to the establishment of UCRH.

The process was not straightforward, but what she remembers most is the support the proposal received across the Northern Rivers.

“I organised all the mayors in the region to do a letter to attach to it,” she says. “They were terrific. Anyone I asked was prepared to do it.”

After months of work, support from across the region and extensive planning, the original vision of a rural clinical school appeared to be slipping away. Liz wasn’t prepared to let the opportunity pass quietly.

She took the campaign directly to decision-makers in Canberra and Sydney, earning a reputation for persistence along the way.

“[Government advisor] Jack Best rang me and he said, ‘You have been causing chaos everywhere’,” she recalls with a chuckle.

But the effort paid off.

“In the end, they couldn’t ignore us. That was the bottom line,” she says.

Liz spent much of her career advocating for improved access to health and education in regional communities. Alongside her involvement with UCRH, she held leadership positions across both sectors and later played a prominent role in campaigns including the successful push to bring radiotherapy services to the Northern Rivers.

At the heart of her work was a belief that regional communities deserved the same opportunities as their metropolitan counterparts.

“It makes such a difference when you’re leading from a regional community and you’ve got everyone beside you,” she says.

When UCRH was established in 2001, Liz and John were optimistic, believing in the possibilities that lay ahead. Over time that optimism has proven remarkably prescient, with UCRH growing into one of Australia’s leading University Departments of Rural Health, supporting education, research and community partnerships across the Northern Rivers and beyond.

She is characteristically modest about her contribution.

“I take no credit other than being involved in getting it. I was helped [by] good people,” she says.