Kate, what is your background?

I qualified with a Bachelor of Science in occupational therapy in 1998. I worked in the NHS for almost eight years before emigrating to Australia in 2006.

My husband has family in Jervis Bay, so we came for a couple of holidays and thought ‘yup, really like that, like the lifestyle’ and obviously the country’s beautiful, and so we decided on Australia for that reason, plus occupational therapists at that time were on the top 10 wanted list – they did actually call it a wanted list – so it just all seemed to fit together and we came.

Where was your first job in Australia?

It was with what is now the Cerebral Palsy Alliance in Nowra. I was there for four-and-a-half years in paediatric occupational therapy and then in 2010, moved to Darwin, where I worked for the Department of Health in the Royal Darwin Hospital, the children’s development team, and then later, the specialist support and forensic disability service that was a newly set up support service between Alice Springs and Darwin.

What differences did you notice between Britain’s NHS and the Australia health system?

So, I think the first thing for me was getting a job with an NGO. That was a new concept to me really. Yes, we did have organisations in England, but I’d never worked for one. It was a bit of a culture shock for me. There were public service opportunities, but a lot of private ones as well. 

The big thing for me was that a lot of the things I had seen in England were just coming through in Australia. It was nice. It felt familiar, so it felt safe in a way when you had so much change around you.

And then you went from the Shoalhaven to Darwin?

My husband was in the Royal Air Force in England. He rejoined the Royal Australian Air Force in Australia in 2010. We’ve come full circle because he did his rookie training here at RAAF Base Wagga and then was posted August 2010 to Darwin and we ended up being there for five years.

I started off as an OT in Royal Darwin Hospital. It was really nice to get back into that acute setting because obviously Shoalhaven had been very much a community outpatient setting, where we worked with people in their own homes or schools.

I then saw an opportunity back with paediatrics, which was again back in a community setting, so that was around Darwin.

I do have a passion for disability. My sister-in-law has a severe intellectual disability, so I've always had an interest in that side of things, and probably where the paediatrics come in. I’ve found that work very rewarding.

I wanted to help kids who might have been overlooked by people who didn’t see their true potential, as I’d seen that happen to my sister-in-law.

And then, your job changed again?

I went on to manage the children’s team and then got a really exciting opportunity to manage the special support and forensic disability unit. Our clients were people who had undertaken a criminal act, but could not be found guilty. They were deemed unfit to plead because of their level of usually intellectual disability that they had and the diagnosis they had received.

They shouldn’t have been in prison, but they needed somewhere secure and safe that could look after them in an appropriate manner, that wasn’t them being locked in a cell because they didn’t actually have a criminal record. It was actually doing that transition from prison to an environment that was safe for them, be that a secure care environment or supported accommodation in the community with appropriate levels of support and care.

I actually flew between Darwin and Alice Springs to do that. It was absolutely amazing. I think that’s why I’ve gone into redevelopment as well, because there were so many stakeholders to talk to as well. There was the justice system – unfortunately some of our guys also had a mental health diagnosis as well, so you had to work with your mental health colleagues for their expert advice, you would work with our disability teams, our suppliers, the hospitals, clinics, doctors, different Aboriginal communities and elders, you name it.

In Alice Springs, we did get into King’s Canyon and to Uluru. We actually travelled a fair distance to take some clients back to country so they could have that time and connection with their community and their land. I learned an absolutely immense amount. I feel really privileged to have had that experience, building that service.

Your current role is as the redevelopment change manager for the Wagga Base Hospital project?

I started here in December 2015. The building had been handed over and we were planning the move of the patients for the following January. To watch that unfold was just amazing. 

We have the floor plan for the new building down. We can show those floorplans. The tender is currently out and that closes this month and we are hoping construction will start in quarter one of 2019.

Behind the scenes, we have started to look at the designs with our clinical experts, asking ‘what would you like a treatment room to look like’, what equipment does it need.