About First Voice

Formation of The Alliance for Deaf Children

The Alliance for Deaf Children (Alliance) was formed in 2003. Known as “the Six Centre Alliance”, the entity was represented by six centres in Australia and New Zealand:

Hear and Say Centre, Queensland
Taralye, Victoria
Telethon Speech and Hearing, Western Australia
The Cora Barclay Centre, South Australia
The Shepherd Centre, New South Wales and Australian Capital Territory
The Hearing House, New Zealand

The Alliance was formed so that member organisations could easily share information, collaborate on challenges, lobby and conduct national fundraising activities. In 2004 the centres formalised the Alliance through a Memorandum of Understanding which defined its membership criteria and addressed issues relating to long term commitment, cooperation and collaboration.

The need for a new entity

The Alliance has operated successfully as an informal, collaborative group of member organisation representing the needs of hearing impaired children in Australia and New Zealand since 2003. However funding and the ongoing viability of member organisations began to emerge as increasingly important issues within the sector. Therefore greater urgency and formality was needed to shape public policy and funding decision making related to hearing impaired children.

As a consequence, a more formalised entity, known as First Voice, was established to lead and advocate for world-class early intervention services for children who are deaf or hearing impaired.

First Voice was launched

First Voice was officially launched by its Patron, Her Excellency Ms Quentin Bryce AC, Governor-General of the Commonwealth of Australia, at Admiralty House in Sydney on 7 October 2010.
Link to the Governor-General’s speech

Link to photo’s from the launch event