Ian Thorpe OAM has been awarded the Australian Human Rights Medal for 2012 for his work with Indigenous children in remote communities across Australia.
For over a decade, Ian has worked as a passionate advocate for Indigenous people with his Fountain for Youth charity, which works with twenty-one remote communities in the Northern Territory.
“When I first visited some of the communities outside Katherine in the Northern Territory I was shocked at the lack of facilities – particularly the schools. While the situation was tough, I could also see these people had hope and with that I saw there was an opportunity to be able to work alongside them,” Thorpe commented
More than 200 entries were received for this year’s Awards with 39 finalists selected in 10 categories.

Winners in the other nine Award categories are:-

Young People’s Human Rights Medal
Krista McMeeken

Law Award
Human Rights Law Centre

Business Awards
Hoyts Cinemas, Village Cinemas, Event/ Greater Union/ Birch Carroll & Coyle Cinemas and Reading Cinemas

Community Individual Award
Pat Anderson

Community Award – Organisation
Aboriginal Legal Service of Western Australia (ALSWA)

Literature (non-fiction) Award
The People Smuggler by Robin de Crespigny – Penguin Australia, May 2012

Print and Online Media Award
Professor Sharon Pickering and The Conversation Academic Expert Panel on Asylum Seekers series – Series of 14 articles published in The Conversation between June and August 2012

Radio Award
Intellectually Disabled People Fight for Access to Justice – PM –ABC Radio National – Produced by Nance Haxton – Aired in January 2012

Television Award
Age of Uncertainty – The Project – Network Ten – Produced by Hamish MacDonald and Sam Clark – Screened over April and May 2012