Dr Karen Nicholls is a Torres Strait Islander woman descending from Boigu Island in the Torres Strait. Dr Nicholls works predominantly in the Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Organisation sector and academia. Dr Nicholls is passionate about health equity and growing the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health workforce. She is on the RACGP Board and is Chair of RACGP Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health.

Karl Briscoe is a proud Kuku Yalanji man from Mossman – Daintree area of Far North Queensland and has worked for over 20 years in the health sector at various levels of government and non-government including local, state and national levels which has enabled him to form a vast strategic network across Australia. Karl is the Chief Executive Officer of National Association for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Workers and Practitioners (NAATSIHWP) based in Canberra where he progresses and represents the invested interests of Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander Health Workers and Health Practitioners. He is passionate about the professions of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Workers and Health Practitioners as they are one of the worlds only culturally based health profession underpinned by National Curriculum and Regulation. Karl’s vision for his people is to see dramatic improvement in the premature mortality rates of our Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, not only in communities but the entire nation, ensuring the life expectancy rates of our people are equivalent or better than that of non-Indigenous Australians.