Charles Race Thorson Mathews was born on 27 March 1935 and is an Australian former politician, academic, author and reformer.
26 Facts About Race Mathews
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Race Mathews was a member of Australia's Federal Parliament and the Victorian State Parliament for the Australian Labor Party.
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Race Mathews was educated at Melbourne Grammar School and Toorak Teachers' College, after which he taught in primary schools in Gippsland and Melbourne from 1953 - 1958.
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In 1960 Mathews was elected secretary of the Australian Fabian Society.
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Race Mathews was secretary or president most of the time until 2006.
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From 1972 to 1975, Race Mathews was the Federal Member for Casey, where he served as the chairman of the House of Representatives Select Committee on Specific Learning Difficulties, and the chairman of the Government Members' Committee on Urban and Regional Development.
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Race Mathews was a member of the Administrative Committee of the Victorian ALP from 1970 - 1977 and 1977 - 1981.
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From 1976 - 1979 Race Mathews was Principal Private Secretary for Clyde Holding and then Frank Wilkes as Leaders of the Opposition in the Parliament of Victoria.
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From 1979 to 1992, Race Mathews served as the State Member for Oakleigh in the Victorian Legislative Assembly during the Cain Government.
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Race Mathews served as Minister for Community Services from 1987 - 1988.
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Race Mathews was a member of the Public Accounts Committee 1980 - 1982, the Privileges Committee 1988 - 1992, and the Economic and Budget Review Committee 1989 - 1992.
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Race Mathews is the author, co-author, or editor of numerous books on politics, co operatives and economics.
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Race Mathews was chairman of the Ministerial Advisory Committee on Co-operatives 1989 - 1992, and wrote two Fabian pamphlets on co-operatives, Building the Society of Equals and Mondragon Lessons for Australia.
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Race Mathews turned his PhD thesis into Jobs of Our Own: Building a Stake-Holder Society, published in 1999.
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Race Mathews then turned his attention to the history of the co-operative movement in Australia and its link to Catholic Social Teaching in the 1930s to 1950s.
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Race Mathews enrolled in the University of Divinity and was awarded a Doctor of Theology in 2014.
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Race Mathews turned his thesis into Of Labour and Liberty: Distributism in Victoria, 1891 - 1966, published in 2017.
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Race Mathews developed an interest in science fiction as a boy and at the age of 16 was instrumental in founding the Melbourne Science Fiction Club in 1952.
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Race Mathews opened two World Science Fiction Conventions in Melbourne, in 1975 and 1985.
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Race Mathews campaigned for the reform of the parliament, and in 2006 helped establish the Accountability Round Table, and was its first chairman.
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Race Mathews was on the board of the Melbourne Recital Centre from 2004 - 2009 and the Australian Centre for the Moving Image for 2006 - 2008.
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Race Mathews met his first wife Geraldine McKeown at Teachers College in 1953.
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In 1971 Race Mathews became close to Ainsley Gotto, personal private secretary to Liberal Party leader John Gorton.
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Race Mathews told Whitlam, who was very tolerant: "You've got to be careful about your pillow talk".
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In 1972 Race Mathews married Iola Hack, a journalist at The Age.
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Iola Race Mathews co-founded the Women's Electoral Lobby and later worked within the Australian Council of Trade Unions to achieve workplace gender equality in the 1980s and 1990s, for which she was awarded an Order of Australia Medal.