Sam Mostyn facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Samantha Mostyn AO
Governor-General of Australia
Designate
Assuming office 1 July 2024
Monarch	Charles III
Prime Minister	Anthony Albanese
Succeeding	David Hurley
Personal details
Born	c. 1965 Canberra, Australian Capital Territory
Spouse	Simeon Beckett
Children	1
Education	Australian National University (BA, LLB)

Samantha Joy Mostyn AO (born c. 1965) is an Australian businesswoman and climate change and gender equity advocate, and first female AFL commissioner. As of 2021 Mostyn is president at Chief Executive Women. She is a board member on numerous boards, including Mirvac, Transurban, GO Foundation, the Climate Council, Virgin Australia, and the Sydney Swans. The Mostyn Medal, for "best and fairest" women in AFL Sydney, is named after her. In April 2024, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese announced that Mostyn will be sworn in as the 28th Governor-General of Australia on 1 July 2024.

Early life and education

Samantha Joy Mostyn was born around 1965 in Canberra, ACT and grew up within the army, her father being an army colonel. He was a graduate of the Royal Military College Duntroon, and served for almost 40 years. Although most of her early years were spent in Canberra, being the family of a military man meant moving around a lot, and included two years living in Adelaide with her grandmother while her father was in Vietnam. She also lived in Melbourne, the United States, and Canada. Her father was William "Bill" Mostyn, who served as a major in the Royal Australian Signal Corps at ADF's Vietnam headquarters during the Vietnam War.

She played a lot of sport as a child, and loved to watch Australian rules football, although not having the opportunity to play herself.

Mostyn holds a BA and LLB from the Australian National University (1986 and 1989 respectively). She undertook research for local chief magistrate Ron Cahill, who was a "rabid" Collingwood fan, while she studied.

Career

Mostyn has held many and non-executive roles in business and government, and has also been involved with advocacy organisations and issues that relate to climate change, gender equality, Indigenous reconciliation, and environmental sustainability. Her work has included roles in business strategy, human resources, culture change, risk management, and community engagement.

Public sector

After leaving university, Mostyn trained as a solicitor while working part-time in the Magistrates Court of New South Wales and later as an associate to Michael Kirby in the New South Wales Court of Appeal. She worked as a solicitor for Freehills and Gilbert + Tobin.

In 1992, Mostyn joined the office of transport and communications minister Bob Collins as a senior policy adviser, specialising in intellectual property and also advising on the introduction of pay television to Australia. She subsequently moved to the office of communications and arts minister Michael Lee, before briefly joining the Seven Network as a broadcast policy manager. In 1995, Mostyn was recruited by prime minister Paul Keating to work in his office as a communications policy adviser. She was also appointed by Keating to the board of the organising committee for the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, where she served until 1996.

In 2022, Mostyn was appointed by the Albanese government as chair of its Women's Economic Equality Taskforce, a post which she still holds as of April 2024^[update]. In 2023, this taskforce recommended that paid parental leave should be extended to a year.

Private sector board and other roles

Mostyn joined telecommunications company Optus in 1996 after leaving Paul Keating's office. As the company's director of government and corporate affairs, she was named "one of the most powerful women in the information technology industry" in 1998 by the Australian Financial Review. In the same year, Mostyn was recruited to join Cable & Wireless plc in London as global head of human resources.

In 2000, she returned to Optus as director of human resources and corporate development. She moved to Insurance Australia Group in 2002 as group executive of culture and reputation. She left IAG in 2008.

In 2005, Mostyn was appointed to the AFL Commission as its first female member. She served as a commissioner until 2016 and was a key figure in the development of the Australian Football League's Respect and Responsibility Policy, as well as an advocate for the creation of the AFL Women's competition. From 2017, she directed the Sydney Swans for six seasons. She continues to support the community work done by the GO Foundation, established and run by former footballers Adam Goodes and Michael O'Loughlin.

In 2010, Mostyn was appointed to the board of Transurban. Also that year, she was appointed non-executive director of Citibank Australia, and in 2015 she was appointed chair of Citi Australia's consumer bank.

On 20 April 2018 she was appointed as a director to the board of Australia's National Research Organisation for Women's Safety (ANROWS), an independent, not-for-profit research organisation which was established by the Commonwealth and all state and territory governments "to produce evidence to support the reduction of violence against women and their children", as a result of Australia's National Plan to Reduce Violence against Women and their Children 2010–2022. Mostyn was chair in 2019-2020.

In 2021 she was on the board of Mirvac, and was named by the Australian Financial Review as Australia's "most influential" company director, serving on boards with a combined market capitalisation of over $480 billion.

Mostyn has previously served on the boards of the Global Business & Sustainable Development Commission, Transurban, Virgin Australia, the Diversity Council of Australia, Reconciliation Australia, the Australia Council for the Arts, and chaired Beyond Blue (where she is still on the board), the Foundation of Young Australians, Ausfilm, Australians Investing in Women, Australian Volunteers International, the Sydney Theatre Company, and Carriageworks. She was also National Mental Health Commissioner, and a past president of the Australian Council for International Development.

She has also served as faculty on the The Prince of Wales's Business & Sustainability Programme, as a non-executive director and sustainability adviser. The role involves leading residential seminars of groups of senior executives.

As of April 2024^[update] she is on the board of property company Mirvac, and chairs the boards of Aware Super, the Centre for Policy Development, and ANROWS.

Governor-General

On 3 April 2024, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese announced that King Charles III had approved the appointment of Mostyn as the next Governor-General of Australia succeeding David Hurley, and that she would be sworn in on 1 July 2024.

The announcement was generally welcomed; by other politicians, including by the leader of the federal Opposition, Peter Dutton, along with colleagues, several women's advocacy organisations, and the Vietnam Veterans Association of Australia. However, some right-wing commentators such as Sky News Australia host Chris Kenny and former executive director of the libertarian think tank Institute of Public Affairs, John Roskam, politician Pauline Hanson, and conservative lobby group Advance Australia, criticised the appointment.

Media

Mostyn has regularly written for, and been quoted in, the media. She spoke at the National Press Club, in November 2021, as president of the Chief Executive Women. She delivered a speech on economic recovery and post-pandemic recovery, describing how Australia can make "the most of its available resources and talent" by investing in care, for paid parental leave, childhood education and superannuation reform, as well as ensuring employees in the care industry, such as teachers, childcare workers and nurses, are receiving well-paid salaries, and respect within the workplace.

"The pandemic has left women exhausted and deepened their inequality, particularly in the workplace. For too long, the uncelebrated driving force behind our luck has been underpaid, or unpaid, women."

Mostyn has also advocated for prevention of Domestic Violence, and for support of Indigenous Australian women. She has been in the media, describing "the Great Exhaustion" following the Covid pandemic unpaid, extra roles of women in parenting and the workforce. She commented that the election in 2022 would be a gendered issue, signing an open letter saying that widespread reform is needed to assist the return to the workplace for Australian women.

Mostyn was a panellist on the Q+A TV show, when audience members asked whether prime minister Scott Morrison's support for women "was genuine", following marches in early 2021. Mostyn commented that recommendations by Kate Jenkins, Sex Discrimination Commissioner, could be implemented and accepted. Media commentary resulted when a male on the panel, journalist Adam Creighton, was involved in a lively exchange with Mostyn, who was defending a women’s rights protest in Canberra. Creighton was attempting to explain that the women’s rights protest had been hijacked by partisan critics of then-prime minister Scott Morrison.

Mostyn has reported on corporate Australia and the gender diversity within the top 300 companies, with 5% of women CEOs in the S&P ASX200 companies. She has also commented on how quotas for gender equity in the workplace work, and how quotas within the AFL have led to improvements in the AFL and the AFLW.

Mostyn has commented that a large number of woman leaders "sends a message to everybody that women are equal and improves overall culture". She has also written in the Sydney Morning Herald about women and the economy.

Climate change work

Mostyn was one of the Australia 2020 Summit participants. She is a chair of the Climate Council and has written about bushfires and climate change for the Climate Council. She is a member of the Climate Change Authority.

In a 2021 event on climate leadership prior to Glasgow 2021, Mostyn interviewed Professor Lesley Hughes.

She was an inaugural board member of Climate Works, and a founding supporter and chair of 1 Million Women, the women's climate action group.

Recognition and awards

• 2015: Mostyn Medal, for "best and fairest" women in AFL Sydney, named after her
• 2018: Honorary doctorate of laws (LLD) from Australian National University, awarded for "exceptional contributions to public service or to the practice of law that is recognised nationally or internationally"
• 2019: Winner, IGCC 2019 Climate Awards
• 2020: United Nations Day Honour award, awarded by the United Nations Association of Australia (NSW) to those who have made a "significant contribution to the aims and objectives of the UN"
• 2021: Officer of the Order of Australia for "distinguished service to business and sustainability, and to the community, through seminal contributions to a range of organisations, and to women"
• 2023: Edna Ryan award: "Grand Stirrer"

Personal life

Mostyn is married to barrister Simeon Beckett of Maurice Byers Chambers in Sydney, and has one daughter.