Annabelle Rankin

Annabelle Rankin
High Commissioner of Australia to New Zealand
In office
18 March 1971 – 12 June 1974
Prime MinisterWilliam McMahon
Gough Whitlam
Preceded byTed Hicks
Succeeded byBrian Clarence Hill
Minister for Housing
In office
26 January 1966 – 22 March 1971
Prime MinisterHarold Holt
John McEwen
John Gorton
William McMahon
Preceded byLes Bury
Succeeded byKevin Cairns
Government Whip in the Senate
In office
11 June 1951 – 8 March 1966
Prime MinisterRobert Menzies
Preceded byReg Wright
Succeeded byMalcolm Scott
Senator for Queensland
In office
1 July 1947 – 24 May 1971
Succeeded byNeville Bonner
Personal details
Born
Annabelle Jane Mary Rankin

(1908-07-28)28 July 1908
South Brisbane, Queensland, Australia
Died30 August 1986(1986-08-30) (aged 78)
South Brisbane, Queensland, Australia
Political partyLiberal
RelationsColin Rankin (father)

Dame Annabelle Jane Mary Rankin DBE (28 July 1908 – 30 August 1986) was an Australian politician and diplomat. She was the first woman from Queensland elected to parliament, the first woman federal departmental minister, and the first Australian woman to be appointed head of a foreign mission.

Rankin was born in Brisbane, the daughter of state MP Colin Rankin. A member of the Liberal Party, she was elected to the Senate at the 1946 federal election, taking her seat the following year. She was the second woman elected to the Senate, after Dorothy Tangney. Rankin was the Liberal Party's chief whip from 1947 to 1950 and from 1951 to 1966; she remains the longest-serving whip in the party's history, in either chamber of parliament. In 1966, she was made Minister for Housing in the Holt government, becoming the first woman to hold a ministerial portfolio. She held that position until her retirement from politics in 1971. As High Commissioner to New Zealand from 1971 to 1974, she was the first woman to head an Australian mission overseas.