Jeannette Young reveals why first pick for new CHO walked away from ‘terrifying’ job
Queenslanders know this latest Governor perhaps better than any other but, for her, the grand mansion and lifestyle she now finds herself in feels a world away from her previous, seventh-floor office at the Queensland Health headquarters in inner-city Brisbane.
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Fernberg, that circa 1865 Italianate mansion that sits atop Paddington in Brisbane’s inner west like a gleaming, white wedding cake, is looking particularly lovely at the moment.
The last of the jacarandas are scattered like purple jewels on its emerald green lawns and the blooming, Double Delight roses are looking, well, doubly delightful.
Also looking particularly well as she greets Qweekend in Fernberg’s drawing room is its newest resident, Her Excellency Dr Jeannette Young, 58.
“Hello, hello,” she says, “thank you so much for coming”, her face instantly familiar in these somewhat unfamiliar surroundings.
Queenslanders know this latest Governor perhaps better than they did any of the previous 26 His or Her Excellencies (at the start of their term) who have made their way up the heritage-listed mansion’s palm-studded driveway.
We know her face; the signature strand of pearls at her neck, the gold, framed glasses, the slightly breathless voice, the raised hands when a point is being made.
After all, prior to her appointment as Governor on November 1, many of us had a daily appointment with her, via our television screens.
The State’s chief health officer (CHO) for 16 years (2005-2021), from early 2020 Dr Young also became the very public hand on the rudder during the coronavirus pandemic.
Indeed, so large did she loom in our living rooms as she delivered the state’s Covid-19 numbers, Queenslanders trying to listen in would ask each other, “What did Jeannette say?”.
So yes, Queenslanders do know this Governor well.
But along with her address, something else has changed with Young. Perhaps not surprisingly, the woman who is now the Queen’s representative in our state looks far more relaxed, and certainly less worried than when she carried the health of an entire state on her shoulders. Sitting down on a sofa beside an arched window in the drawing room, she smiles at a staff member bringing tea and water: “That’s lovely.”
And it is lovely; Fernberg, with its soaring ceilings and 18 hectares of gardens, its pretty, private rooms upstairs, accessed by a grand timber staircase.
It feels a world away from her previous, seventh-floor office at the Queensland Health headquarters in inner-city Brisbane.
It feels further still from Rockhampton, the central Queensland town she moved to from Sydney in 1994 as the newly appointed executive director of medical services of its hospital. Back then, she was a newly divorced, 33-year-old single mother to daughter Rebecca, then three, now 29 and a mother herself.
The move to Queensland was one of life’s so-called sliding-door moments; Dr Young had also been offered a position in Ballarat, and chose Queensland largely because of its
warmer weather.
Today, as she and her husband, Professor Graeme Nimmo, settle into their Vice Regal roles, it’s safe to say she made the right call.
But if anyone had told the young mother and medico in those early Rockhampton days she would one day become the Governor of the state she had pinned her hopes on, she would not have believed it.
And, as Dr Young candidly admits, at times, she finds it hard to believe.
“It’s been fantastic, and I feel like I’ve been here forever … but walking in (to Fernberg) for the first time is a bit daunting,” say Young, who also has a daughter, Jane, 20, with Nimmo.
“Particularly after that first day when we had the swearing-in ceremony; that was all a bit of a blur. That day was just astounding to me, coming directly from there to Government House was very surreal and at times, totally unbelievable, but it was so special, the way they (Fernberg’s staff) welcomed me.
“As I was coming up the drive, they had organised some children from the Murri school to line the driveway because they know part of my focus is that I want to work with First Nations (people), and then they also had some children from my husband Graeme’s old school, Ashgrove State School, so that just made us both feel so welcome.
“The team here are brilliant, they really know what they are doing, and they are very good at guiding us through what we need to do and what we need to know.”
Young smiles. “The good thing is I have the time to learn, and one of the things I have to desperately learn is to stop walking so fast. I cannot walk slowly, I rush out of places and later I think, ‘That was a bit rude’.”
She laughs: “I have to learn there’s no need for speed.”
But perhaps her former haste is understandable, given the often hectic and peripatetic nature of her former role.
“I just went to so many different places for press conferences (as CHO) and always drove myself. I absolutely hate being late, so I would just be so stressed trying to get there, and my sat nav would take me on these weird and wonderful routes.”
Punctuality will no longer be a problem for Young. The role of Queensland Governor comes with its own driver, something Young admits is “the best”.
“Now I am never late, and it’s just wonderful because I can’t be late, I can’t hold up so many people. It’s very nice not to have to worry.”
While Young is refreshingly open about her appreciation of the particular accoutrements of her new role; the beautiful home, the driver, the gleaming 1972 Rolls-Royce Phantom (used only for particular ceremonial occasions, and for the short, weekly turn down George St – standard flying – to the executive council meeting with the state government), she is far more interested in the job itself, the work; starting with learning all she can about her new role. And also, despite her earlier vow to “slow down”, the 27th Governor of Queensland intends to hit the ground running.
“We are still working through all the patronages, about 150 of them, which is a little daunting, and I am not sure what they all want from me yet,” Young says.
“I want to do more than just be a name on a letterhead but, of course, if that’s all they want that’s fine, too, but I want to meet with every one of them and find out what I can do to really assist them.”
There are also the constitutional, ceremonial and community duties which are part of being the Head of State, the Queen’s representative in Queensland. Constitutionally, this involves, among other duties, those weekly executive council meetings, where legislation is signed by the Governor after being passed through state parliament.
The Governor also has the right to appoint and dismiss the Premier of Queensland, and all other cabinet ministers, as well as issuing writs to the election of state parliament.
This part of the job, while important, is largely prescriptive; it’s in the other areas that Young, like the other governors before, intends to make her mark.
“The ceremonial part is so important,” she says.
“I went to my first Remembrance service (as Governor) on Remembrance Day, and I think about how can I make it that little bit more special for people, what is it I can do to help people who often are grieving at those events, how can I make it more meaningful to them?”
As the third medical practitioner in the role following Sir William MacGregor (1909-1914) and Sir John Goodwin (1927-1932), Young believes her professional background will help her answer some of those questions.
“Being a doctor you do learn how to talk to people to find out what they are really worried about. People would present with something and you’d think: ‘There’s no way that’s why you’re here’. So you learn to speak with them about what’s really on their mind and how to help them.”
Young’s medical background will also inform the third prong of her duties – community – and she intends to, in her new capacity, visit every hospital across the state.
“I want to thank them,” she says simply.
“Some are big and some are very small, but I want to travel to every single one. I now have the opportunity to speak to every single health service because they are continually criticised, and they should be if there are errors, but they also need to be thanked, and I can’t wait to personally do just that.”
Also on the agenda, a visit to every single, discrete First Nation community, again “as soon as possible”.
“I want to visit them all, it sounds a lot, but I do have five years,” she smiles.
“As CHO I did go out to those communities and see quite a few, and things are getting better, in terms of maternity welfare, smoking rates, and housing improvements, but I know we need to do more, I know we need to listen, and I think we can do better in terms of health facilities, certainly.”
Other areas Young is particularly keen on advocating for, or lending her support to, are literacy, particularly indigneous literacy – “if you are a reader you can see the world beyond your world”, as well as promoting Queensland’s fresh produce, and opening up Fernberg itself to more visitors.
“Once the borders are open again, I want to explore ways we can really use this (house) as a major asset for Queensland.”
The borders.
A tricky subject for the new Governor, who in her role as CHO, was not without detractors, mostly for her hard-line stance in keeping Queensland closed for business, if that business was based interstate or overseas.
Along with Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk, who she stood shoulder to shoulder with in those hundreds of Covid media calls, Young was also criticised for disparities between those who weren’t allowed into the state (most people), and those who were (the occasional singing star and footballers). Mixed messaging about the AstraZeneca vaccine also caused confusion, subsequently blamed for a slower take up of it.
While her new position, is apolitical, and requires a certain amount of diplomacy, Governor Young does not shirk questions about her old role and she remains unapologetic over her handling of the pandemic.
“It (Covid-19) is no different to any other disease, and the only reason we did it the way we did is our hospital system and our society would not have coped if we’d all got sick at the start, the way we saw in places like New York, London, Italy and everywhere else that is not coping now,” she says.
“The whole idea with a pandemic is you have to stop the spread as much as you can until you have a vaccine, and after that you go back to normal. You don’t then want to keep on trying to stop the disease, because you can’t, but if you are vaccinated – everyone just needs to be double vaxxed, and then go and get your third dose, six months after – and you do need that third – it’s very effective, it gives you really good protection.”
In this moment, she is once again the CHO of Queensland, not its Governor, her voice containing all the urgency of her previous mantra: Vaccinate, vaccinate, vaccinate.
And as absorbing as her new role is, it would be understandable if some part of her misses her old one, given (even her critics would have to concur) her unquestionable commitment. Not a bit of it, she says. “No, no, no, no,” she answers crisply, then adds for good measure, “not at all.”
Still, her leave-taking was perhaps not as smooth as she would have hoped.
Her initial successor, Dr Krispin Hajkowicz withdrew from the role just days before he was due to take up the position, citing personal reasons.
The withdrawal left the state without a permanent CHO for weeks, with Dr Peter Atkin (the Deputy CHO) acting in the role until Dr John Gerrard, director of infectious diseases at the Gold Coast University Hospital was finally named on November 22.
Governor Young says she’s “very pleased” with Gerrard’s appointment, calling him “an accomplished physician”.
And while his shock resignation was not ideal timing, it’s clear Hajkowicz also has her support, and her empathy.
“People were put off because of the way I did the job but that’s me, and I did it at the cost of my personal life. I don’t think I took a day off, but my youngest daughter was 18 (at the start of the pandemic) and my husband had retired to support me, and I don’t know if I could have done it otherwise.
“So I think that might have terrified Krispin when he came in for a few weeks and saw how I did that job, because he does have young children and his wife works, so I can see how that might affect things, certainly.
“Actually, I did take a few days off to see my daughter after she had her baby, but I kept fully engaged the whole time. That’s just the way I am, that’s the only way I know how to work, but the job actually doesn’t have to be done the way I did it. It was my own choice to work so hard.”
She intends, she says, to do just the same in her new role.
“I see this very much as another caretaker role, so I don’t intend changing at all, I care deeply for Queenslanders, and I will keep working as hard as I can for them.”
And as she does, the man who retired to support her during the pandemic will be right by her side.
“Well, she’s pretty marvellous, actually,” Nimmo says of his wife, watching her speak to a group of schoolchildren later that afternoon at a Government House reception.
The couple, who married in March, 2000, are known to be extremely close, with Nimmo, a clinical microbiologist and former Queensland Health State Director of Microbiology, clearly chuffed with his wife’s latest achievement.
Like Dame Quentin Bryce’s late husband, Michael Bryce, who would prove to be his wife’s anchor during her term as Queensland Governor, and later Governor-General, Nimmo is happy to step back to allow his wife to step up.
“At the start of the pandemic, when we had that awful teleconference with all of Australia’s chief health officers where we were first told about the virus, I could hardly talk because my mind went “this is going to be an absolute nightmare, and it was,” Governor Young recalls.
“I went to Graeme and I said ‘I just can’t do this’, and he said, ‘Yes, you can’ and immediately made the decision to retire because he said we can’t both do our jobs, and that it was time for the next generation in his work, so that he could support me.”
Nimmo has been saying “yes, you can” to his wife ever since. Asked to describe what she will bring to the role of Governor, Nimmo smiles.
“Well, she’s energetic, she’s so committed to this, she’s decisive, if there’s a job to be done she will do it as perfectly as it can be done without stint,” he says, before adding the aforementioned “she’s pretty marvellous, actually”.
For her part, Young says one of the most enjoyable parts of her new role is watching her husband of 21 years grow into his.
Nimmo will have his own patronages, and the couple will also share some joint roles. They have already accepted a patronage for the Returned & Services League (Nimmo was a Lieutenant Colonel in the army reserves).
“I’ve discovered something about him I didn’t know, and that is he is absolutely wonderful at talking to people and encouraging them to tell their stories, he’s really, really good at it,” Young says.
“We made the decision very early on that we were not going to stand together (at functions and events), that we would divide and then talk to everyone. And he’s really enjoying it, he’s so good at putting people at ease. I had to learn that, but it is a very natural thing with Graeme.”
The couple recently became grandparents to 10-month-old Calvin, the son of daughter Rebecca and her husband Grant, who live in Sydney.
And just like every other Queenslander, they are hoping to be reunited with their family for Christmas.
At the time of writing, news of the worrying new Covid variant, Omicron, was breaking, and the truth is that, still, no-one knows what impact it will have on any of us.
What it means for Queensland will be under the watch of new CHO Gerrard.
What it means for the Governor is that, among all of Covid's other complications, it might impact their travel plans.
“I did meet Calvin briefly when my daughter became very unwell about six weeks after she had him, so I went down to look after him because my daughter was infectious and I couldn’t see her in hospital,” Young says.
“He’s so gorgeous, he’s crawling now, he crawls backwards, and then forwards,” she laughs delightedly, “and yes I very much intend to spoil him. You are allowed to do that when you are a grandma.”
If all goes to plan, Governor Young, Nimmo and their daughter Jane, who lives with them at Government House and who is finishing a university degree, will travel to Sydney for Christmas Day.
Her parents, Dr David and Lilly Young, still live in the family home in St Ives on Sydney’s North Shore.
Young attended St Ives High School, before completing her five-year medical degree at the University of Sydney, the city in which she started her career as a doctor.
Young also has two sisters in Sydney.
One day, she hopes to invite all her family to Fernberg; to greet them at its front door with her husband and daughter by her side, and take them upstairs to the family quarters where she, like governors de Jersey, Bryce et al before her, has made a private home within her public one.
“They give you some rooms, there’s a bedroom and bathroom, a lounge and a kitchen, and you are able to bring your own furniture there.
“So we have our own things from our (Holland Park) home, and it’s nice to have them.”
At night, after a day which begins officially at 8.30am, and ends at about 6pm, if there is no evening function, and there usually is about four nights a week, Young and Nimmo retire to those upstairs rooms where she can look out Fernberg’s arched windows over the hills of Paddington and the city that has given her so much.
“I first came to Brisbane in 1988 when I visited Expo 88,” she recalls, “and I had the most fantastic week”.
“I remember I thought it was just a magical place”.
The now Governor of that state smiles. “I still do.”
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