Meet the executive members of the WA Branch 2010

Tracy Martin has many roles of which one is President of the WA Branch. She is a midwife with over 15 yrs experience in maternity care having recently worked in antenatal care. She is also a member of the Professional Practice Committee at the NMBWA.





Abbey works with women and their families planning to birth at home.
Encouraging, facilitating and supporting women to make choices for themselves and their babies that inspire their culture, their mind and their heart is what moves me to the core. Strong competent human beings rise from such a basic evolutionary process if guarded and treated with the respect birth deserves. Most of the time all we as midwives need to do is be there and believe in her.
Abbey is the Vice President of the College.



Jill Banks became a midwife in Portsmouth UK, since coming to Australia Jill has worked mainly in country areas and is well versed with the issues country midwives encounter. Jill now works in a small metro hospital as a midwifery manager. Jill is the Fundraising and Publicity Officer.





Karen Kruit is the Aboriginal Liaison: a midwife with a passion for holistic maternity care for all women. As a midwifery consultant for Aboriginal Maternity Care, I am pleased to note the intention of the college to expand their support for midwives working in rural and remote health services. This will help to strenghten the professional identity in their local communities and inform women about the benefits of having midwifery led maternity care.


Shelley Gower is the Consumer Representative. Shelley has been involved in maternity related community organisations since 2004. She was Convener of Birthrites: Healing After Cesarean for 2 years and served on the Board of Community Midwifery WA for 18 months. She has recently worked as Project Coordinator for the Curtin University School of Nursing and Midwifery on a NHMRC funded project on women's experienced of pregnancy and childbirth.


Janice Butt has a joint appointment as Coordinator of Midwifdery Education at KEMH and Associate Director of Midwifery at Curtin University. Janice is passionate about the profession of midwifery and is dedicated to the development of midwifery as a independent profession working in collaboration with its medical partners. Janice is a fellow of the ACM and is also currently one of the midwife members on the WA Nurses and Midwives Board. Janice is the Midwifery Education Standards Advisory Committee (MESAC) Representative.


Pauline Costins is the National Director Representative for WA. Pauline is passionate about giving women informed choice about pregnancy and birth options. She is also passionate about passing on information to midwives about their legal, ethical and professional frameworks, her special interests are law and ethics. Pauline is a lecturer at Curtin University in the School of Nursing and Midwifery and also works one day a week clinically and a member of the Network Advisory Committee at the NMBWA.


Terri Barrett is the BHFI representative: Terri is also the Midwifery Director of Statewide Obstetric Support Unit; this unit provides operational support to public maternity services across WA.







Susan Cudlipp is the Community Midwifery Representative: she is a midwife working for CMP and has served on the CMWA Board for 2 years. Susan also has experience of working in Family Birth Centres. She is passionate about women's choices about where and with whom they birth with particularly Homebirth and midwifery led care.




Dr Ravani Chetty is the Education Officer, she is a senior lecturer in the School of Nursing and Midwifery at Curtin University. She has taught midwifery in South Africa and United Arab Emirates. Ravani also has a joint appointment with Joondulup Health Campus as a midwife-nurse research consultant. Her research focus is adolescent maternity care.


Pauline Moore is a member of the education committee. She is passionate about midwifery and providing women informed choice. Pauline currently works in the Next Birth After Caesarean Section Clinic (NBAC) which assists women to have choice about their next birth after a caesarean section.





Sylvia Jenkin is a member of the education committee. Sylvia is a direct entry midwife from Germany, who has worked in Germany, NZ and now Perth. She is passionate about midwifery, homebirth, waterbirth and providing continuity of care for women. She currently works as a casual midwife who particularly enjoys working in the Family Birth Centre.





Trish Dempsey: Minute secretary: Trish is a midwifery educator at KEMH and holds an adjunct appointment with Curtin University. Trish has worked in all areas of practice including neonatal intensive care. She coordinates the midwifery return to practice programs and neonatal resuscitation assessors program. She is also a member of the Education and Research Advisory Committee and Network Advisory Committee at the NMBWA.


Meet our general secretary Laura Robertson- who is a rotational midwife working across nearly every aspect of midwifery practice. Laura is passionate about working with women to make the most of their childbirth experience,and about working with midwives to make their work fulfilling, ie.offering women a wider choice of place of birth would lead to midwives practicing across the full scope of midwifery practice. Laura is also passionate about midwives maintaining traditional skills through everyday use - a challenge.



'Birth is not only about making babies. It's about making
mothers -strong, competent, capable mothers who trust themselves and believe
in their inner strength." - Barbara Katz Rothman