Sarah Holland-Batt

Biography: Sarah Holland-Batt is an award-winning poet, editor and critic, and an Associate Professor at QUT. Her most recent book, The Hazards, won the Prime Minister’s Literary Award for Poetry. Her writing has been recognised with numerous honours and awards, including Yaddo and MacDowell fellowships in the United States, the Australia Council B.R. Whiting Literature Residency in Rome, and a Sidney Myer Creative Fellowship. She recently appeared as a witness at the Brisbane hearings of the Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety, where she testified about the abusive treatment and neglect her father has experienced in his aged care facility. Her testimony focussed on the facility’s response to a whistle-blower who came forward detailing deliberate victimisation of her father, and the handling of her formal complaint by the regulator, the Aged Care Complaints Commission (ACCC).