A fascinating diplomatic career

Sue Boyd AM

Sue Boyd had just returned to Australia from her first diplomatic posting to Portugal when the call came from then Prime Minister Gough Whitlam for a briefing on what was happening in the country.

“I was in Canberra when news broke that the Carnation Revolution had happened in Portugal,” Sue tells Have a Go News. “Then I heard that the prime minister wanted someone from foreign affairs to brief him on the matter and he didn’t want some old fuddy duddy; he wants someone who really knows.

“So I tidied myself up, pulled my mini skirt to a respectable level and tottered off to the old Parliament House through the rose gardens and met Gough, who asked:

“Susan, what is going on in Portugal, what does it mean for Australia and what should we do about it?”

The encounter with Whitlam was early in Sue’s career as a diplomat which took her around the world as the head of diplomatic missions in Fiji, Hong Kong, Vietnam and Bangladesh. She also had postings at the United Nations in New York and in the former East Germany.

After migrating to Perth from Britain with her family in 1966, her experiences are recounted in her fascinating book, Not Always
Diplomatic
, An Australian Woman’s Journey through international affairs.

Sue Boyd AM has rubbed shoulders with some of the great political leaders in Australia (former foreign minister Gareth Evans is a good friend) and overseas, but her sense of humour and down-to-earth attitude shine through in her book.

Her love of art and collecting is depicted in colour plates at the front of the book, beside family photos and those taken at various overseas posts.

“Portugal was my first posting and after that I was posted to East Berlin in a hurry. They said: “‘we need someone in East Berlin and someone who speaks German and you do.

“So off I went and after that I was posted to the United Nations in New York and then Hong Kong and Bangladesh which was my first head-of-mission posting.

“I continued to serve overseas until 2002 when I returned to Perth because my father had died and my mother was here with my sister Lynda and she really had the job of caring for our parents while I was away.

“It was time to come back, which suited me because I was young enough to then go on to a second career.”

Sue joined the foreign service after leaving the University of WA in 1970 and a brief stint as a journalist on Perth’s now defunct afternoon newspaper the Daily News

“I was taken in as one of the 23 training diplomats and only two of us were women. The Department of Foreign Affairs at the time was a bit hostile towards women, thinking we were a waste of money, that we would marry, get pregnant and have babies.

“But luckily, the federal government of the time had decided there had to be more women in the public service. So we had to show we were serious and weren’t just there looking for a husband, we were there to do a good job and be respected.

“The hostility dropped off and they found that many of these prejudices towards women were unfounded. There were very few countries that women couldn’t be posted to, so I had 35 years in the foreign service.”

Sue says keeping diaries as a diplomat was not permitted because of security issues, so most of her book was written from memory.

In a foreword, former WA Governor and politician Kim Beazley, a friend from university days, says the book can be read at several different levels.

“At one level it is about a women raised in the last phase of the British Empire in a family enmeshed in the business end of that Empire. Then an almost accidental migration to Australia.

“Where despite misgivings she flung herself wholeheartedly into the opportunities and affairs of her new country. A pioneer for women in the foreign affairs department.

“At another level, Sue’s book can be read as a view from the engine room, of the making of Australian foreign policy. This is so important now.”

Not Always Diplomatic, An Australian Woman’s Journey through international affairs ($30, UWA Publishing) is available from the Lane Bookshop in Claremont, and directly from the publishers, UWA Publishing.

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Josephine Allison
Josephine Allison started her career in journalism at 18 as a cadet on the Geraldton Guardian newspaper. She realised her ambition to work on a daily newspaper when she later joined The West Australian where she spent almost 34 years covering everything from police courts to parliament, general news, the arts and real estate. After moving on from The West, she worked on several government short-term media contracts and part-time at a newspaper in Midland before joining Have a Go News in 2012. These days she enjoys writing about interesting people from various fields, often unsung heroes who have helped make WA a better place.