Mary Gaudron, first female judge of Australia’s high court, dies aged 83

Legal pioneer remembered as an advocate for equality and champion of women in the workplace

Mary Gaudron, the first woman appointed to the high court of Australia, has been honoured for her contributions to the legal landscape after her death at the age of 83.

Gaudron was appointed to the high court in 1987, aged 44, and served until 2003.

While serving on the high court, she contributed to decisions that shaped Australian law, including the landmark native title case , Mabo v Queensland.

In the decision, Gaudron and a fellow high court judge, William Deane, wrote of Aboriginal dispossession as “the darkest aspect of the history of this country”.

Born on 5 January 1943, in the north-west New South Wales town of Moree, Gaudron blazed a trail in a male-dominated profession.

After studying law at the University of Sydney on a scholarship and initially practising primarily in defamation and industrial law, she became the first woman appointed to the NSW Bar Council in 1972.

That same year she successfully argued the equal pay case before the conciliation and arbitration commission. In 1974 she was appointed deputy president of the commission, later presiding over a test case for maternity leave.

After stepping down from the high court in 2003, Gaudron took a job with the International Labour Organization in Geneva and became president of its administrative tribunal.

In 2000 she laid bare what she believed were the true views of some powerful men on women’s equality.

“There are, I think, people who do not accept that men and women are equal, who do not think of equality as a good thing and, indeed, who actually fear the equal participation of women in the workplace,” she said.

The governor general, Sam Mostyn, said Gaudron’s legacy endured in the many people who continued to follow the path she helped forge.

“As the first woman appointed to the high court of Australia, and the only woman justice in the court’s first century, she broke new ground and inspired generations of Australians to pursue careers in the law and public service,” Mostyn said in a social media post on Sunday.

“Justice Gaudron brought her fierce intellect, integrity, compassion and a deep commitment to justice to every role she held.