Actor Geoffrey Rush has won the leading role of Australian of the Year, joining a stellar cast of Australia Day award recipients including South Australian Maggie Beer. Accepting the award in Canberra last night, Rush praised his nation as “the plucky country” whose people “love acting the goat, taking the mickey, cracking a joke, spinning a yarn”. Five Australians, including conductor Richard Bonynge, received the nation’s top honour, with their appointments as Companions of the Order of Australia. The highest honour conferred in South Australia was Officer of the Order of Australia, which went to Justice Robyn Layton and international medical specialists Dr Ian Darnton-Hill and Dr David Pugsley. And celebrity cook Maggie Beer‘s Australia Day lunch of yabbies, rabbit pie and pavlova will be plated up with an extra serving of national pride. She was appointed a Member of the Order of Australia for her service to the tourism and hospitality industries as a cook, restaurateur and author, as well as for her promotion of Australian produce and cuisine.

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Women’s rights advocates say it’s unacceptable that a majority of nominations viagra Order of Australia honours are for men. This year there were 599 men nominated for Order of Australia awards for today’s honours compared with 234 women. Since 1975, there have been 51,409 Order of Australia nominations (Queen’s Birthday and Australia Day honours) – 37,201 for men and 14,208 for women, according to the Australian Honours and Awards Secretariat. Businesswoman Carol Schwartz said it was an appalling statistic. She said many male politicians and public servants were getting Australian honours ”for doing their job, for which they are getting paid well, without necessarily being involved in broader community activities”.

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Stay at home or back to work? The choice can be fraught. Gorgi Coghlan and other mums talk about guilt, career and why dads don’t seem to suffer as much. As someone who excelled as a news reporter, musical performer, high school teacher and equestrian competitor, Gorgi Coghlan, 36, wanted to tackle one more role – motherhood. “I’ve always been a career girl and I couldn’t wait to have kids. But I wasn’t sure how I’d go with being at home.” So when The Circle co-presenter gave birth to daughter Molly-Rose in late 2010, she was surprised to find one of the biggest challenges wasn’t staying at home. Quite the opposite, in fact: it was returning to the job she loves.

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A recent survey of Australian women online delves into social media habits, divulging some interesting points domestic retailers should seriously consider. The Australian Women and Social Media 2011 Survey, carried out by Mum PR and Brand Meets Blog, was conducted via email, Facebook, Google+, Twitter, LinkedIn and Mum PR and Brand Meets Blogs’ personal and business blogs.  It polled 708 women in December, with 95 percent of respondents aged between 22 and 49. A key revelation is the way in which women are utilising blogs.  With 92 percent of women online reading blogs, and 47 percent of businesswomen using blogs for marketing purposes, these online channels are demonstrating why they’re an ever important tool for retail businesses.

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Corporate Australia has set a record for the number of women directors joining big company boards, but they remain greatly outnumbered by their male counterparts. Figures compiled by the Australian Institute of Company Directors show that a record number of 65 women joined the boards of ASX200 companies during last year – six more than 2010. Women now make up an all-time-high of 13.5 per cent of ASX200 directorships – a figure that, while still low, is a big rise on the previous year’s 8.4 per cent.

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