Social Justice Champion dedicates award to ‘my beautiful girl’ Gracie

Susan Wallis, the Illawarra’s 2026 Social Justice Champion, dedicated her award to “my beautiful girl” Gracie at Community Industry Group’s luncheon on Tuesday.

Delivering an impromptu speech from the heart to an audience of 150 people, including her husband Mark and 18-year-old daughter Sophie, Susan said Gracie remains an enduring inspiration.

“She was a beautiful 13-year-old who we sadly lost in 2018,” Susan said.

“Gracie was stillborn and revived, and experienced a very significant disability as a result.

“But Mark and I agreed from the time she was born that she was perfect, and we went through the world and shared that message everywhere we went.”

Susan chairs the board at Interchange Illawarra, a not-for-profit supporting people with disabilities and their families, and her nomination hailed her “can-do, never say-die attitude”. She is a passionate advocate, community connector and fundraiser, who has taken on the City to Surf, the Great Illawarra Walk and the Kokoda Track.

The Wallis family funds an International Women’s Day Illawarra Committee award to help to support young women with disability to pursue their dreams. The Gracie Wallis Scholarship is a tribute to the memory of the girl affectionately known as ‘Amazing Grace’, who was born with a hypoxic brain injury and cerebral palsy, and went on to become a much-loved local face of the NDIS campaign ‘Every Australian Counts’.

“Gracie proved that you don't need to be able to walk and talk to leave an impact, and I've been driven by her memory and making sure that her life meant something, and she certainly has done that,” Susan said.

“So, to my beautiful girl, wherever you are … I shouldn’t be receiving this because you should be here, but I’d just like to remind people that disabled doesn't mean lesser; it's just different. 

“And if Gracie Wallis can make the world better, so can all of you – and you are doing that. So thank you very much. You're all social impact champions.”

Room full of champions

Federal MPs Alison Byrnes and Carol Berry, and Wollongong City Councillor Linda Campbell attended the 2026 Social Justice Luncheon, which was held at the Sage Hotel and organised by Community Industry Group, the peak body for not-for-profit community sector organisations across southern NSW.

The event brought together a host of remarkable people, including the inaugural Social Justice Champion, dementia advocate Val Fell OAM, whose advice on handing over her trophy was: “Never look down on anybody unless you’re giving them a hand up.” Dr Aunty Barbara Nicholson, the 91-year-old publisher of the Dreaming Inside series who still visits jails to run writing workshops, gave the Welcome to Country and Nas Campanella, the ABC's national disability affairs reporter, delivered the keynote address.

Nas shared both the personal experiences and public facts that drive her journalism, including testimony from the Disability Royal Commission indicating 90% of women with intellectual disability are likely to have experienced some form of abuse and violence.

“Sadly, they are things that I was reading about when I was a teenager, and they are things that I now report on,” she said.

In an inspiring and uplifting address, the ABC journalist spoke about practical actions everyone can take in the interest of social justice.

“It can be as simple as calling out ableist language when you're out and about. It can be what my husband does when we're out at a cafe and someone says to him, "What would she like to order? And him saying, ‘Why don't you ask her?’ It can be when I was 36 weeks pregnant, going in to have an ultrasound, and the doctor turning to my husband and saying, ‘When is her baby due?’ And my husband saying, ‘Why don't you ask her? She's right there.’ 

“It can also be in supporting people with a phone call to check in and see if they're okay. It can be teaching your children the right language to use when they see someone that looks really different when they're out and about. 

“I know, from my perspective as a parent – I have a four-and-a-half-year-old now – we have always used really specific language, particularly about disability.

"So my son will actively tell his peers, 'My mum is blind. She uses her hands to see, not her eyes.' But he will also tell people … 'Mummy loves being asked questions', because Mummy does.”

Community Industry Group’s second annual award attracted a strong list of nominees and event MC Ed Birt took time to recognise the achievements of all the finalists. These included Bill Dowson, who chairs the CRAM Foundation; Professor Kathy Eager, whose research has drawn national attention to the Illawarra’s hospital bed block and aged care shortage; Margaret Bowen, the retired Disability Trust CEO who continues to serve as a director; Penny Dordoy, CEO of SASSI, which helps women and children escaping domestic violence and homelessness; and Sharon Callaghan, who has campaigned for a fairer community for five decades, working across everything from youth services to the union movement. 

Foundation of healthy society

In her speech, CI Group CEO Nicky Sloan acknowledged both the current challenges and the reasons for hope.

“I think if we're being honest, social justice isn't having a great time around the world,” Nicky said. 

“Around the world, we're seeing a rise in in division and anger and fear…

“The language, I think we would all agree, of exclusion is becoming louder. The idea that some people matter more than others has become more acceptable than we would have even thought of a decade ago, and across many democracies, we're seeing what can only be described as the politics of hate.

"Instead of bringing people together, some leaders are seeking power by dividing communities. They're identifying another to blame for all that economic hardship, for all that social change, for all that cultural anxiety. It's migrants, it's refugees, it's people living on welfare, it's people with disability, it's First Nations communities, it's members of the LGBTIQA+ community – and any other convenient target that you want to name.

"And history tells us that this approach isn't new, but it also tells us that it's really, really dangerous.”

Nicky said the awards come at a difficult time for local services, which are battling for funding to continue their work, but this makes it all the more important to recognise the values this city holds.

“For many people, the promise of a fair go seems just a little bit more fragile than it used to, and and that reality should concern all of us because social justice isn't a niche issue. It's not something that belongs to us in the community sector, or to advocates, or to governments. 

“Social justice, I think, is the foundation of any healthy society.”