Gladys Berejiklian Biography

Gladys Berejiklian was born in Sydney, Australia, on September 22, 1970. She was the eldest of the three daughters of her Armenian-origin parents, Krikor and Arsha.

She, apparently, had a twin sister who died at childbirth. Berejiklian came to know about her when she needed her birth certificate to get a passport at 13 and it read “elder of the twins.”

She is a grandchild of survivors of the Armenian genocide perpetrated by Turkish soldiers, which killed over 1.5 million people between 1915 and 1917. Her grandparents later moved to Syria, where her father was born and still has a part of his family. His father later moved to Australia for better prospects.

She attended the co-educational school North Ryde High School, which later came to be known as the Peter Board High School. As a primarily school student in Australia, she did not speak English very well and was more comfortable in Armenian. She is still fluent in Armenian. She was good in academics and often topped her class.

She later attended the University of Sydney, from where she obtained a BA and a graduate diploma in international studies in 1996. In 2001, she obtained a master’s in commerce from the University of New South Wales.

In 1993, Gladys Berejiklian became part of the Liberal Party in 1993, and from 1997 to 1998, she served as the president of the New South Wales Young Liberals, scripting history as its the third female president.

She served on a number of committees and councils and was a Delegate to State Council and Chair of Convention Committee. She initially also served as a general manager for Commonwealth Bank and worked for Peter Collins and Senator Helen Coonan, too.

In 2003, she became a Member of the New South Wales Parliament for Willoughby and continued serving in her post till 2021. In 2005, she became the Shadow Minister for Mental Health. The following year, she became part of the opposition front bench portfolio of Transport. She also managed the shadow portfolio of Citizenship.

Under the O'Farrell government, in 2011, she became the Transport Minister and made significant efforts, such as extending the Sydney Light Rail Dulwich Hill Line to Dulwich Hill and the construction of the North West Rail Link. She also removed the function of Transit Officers in railway law enforcement and transferred the responsibility to the NSW Police.

Under the Baird government, she served as the Minister for the Hunter. In 2015, she took over as the Treasurer of New South Wales and the Minister for Industrial Relations. She witnessed the progress of NSW as a debt-free zone.

In 2017, after Mike Baird resigned as the NSW Liberal leader, Gladys Berejiklian became the 45th Premier of New South Wales, virtually unopposed, on January 23 that year. She also scripted history as the first elected female NSW Premier, the only conservative female political leader in Australia, and the first female Liberal member to be a Premier. However, she has never been too amused by the mention of “female” before her designation and believes in gender-neutral functions.

She built an economically strong nation. In 2019, the NSW government ended with a $700 million surplus, in-spite of a record expenditure on infrastructure and billions spent on drought relief.

She is known for her efficient handling of reproductive health in her country and was lauded for managing the debate regarding the Reproductive Health Care Reform Bill in 2019. The bill decriminalized abortion in NSW.

Gladys Berejiklian also led the NSW drought and bushfire recovery in 2019 from the front and declared a pre-emptive emergency when danger levels were predicted in November that year. She is believed to have worked round-the-clock during the bushfire season, to control the impending disaster, and spent $75 million on bushfire relief.

Her efforts as the Premier won her the McKinnon Political Leader of the Year honor in 2019. However, she resigned as the Premier in October 2021, soon after the Independent Commission Against Corruption declared that they were investigating a possible breach of public trust or encouragement of corrupt conduct during her relationship with former Liberal Party MP from Wagga Wagga, Daryl Maguire. The investigation results are yet to be revealed.

Following her retirement from politics, Gladys Berejiklian began her career as an executive with the telecommunication giant Optus. She also made it clear in an interview that she had no plans to run for the Premier’s office again.

She was hired by Optus to run its enterprise, business, and institutional division as its managing director and has had a successful stint with them so far, securing two major contracts: one for terminal and outdoor 5G coverage at the Melbourne airport and the other for an agreement extension with the NSW Telco Authority, regarding the use of satellite services by emergency service agencies as and when required.

Gladys Berejiklian is a staunch follower of the Armenian Apostolic Church. In June 2021, she began dating high-profile barrister Arthur Moses, who represented her in the corruption case involving her former boyfriend, Daryl Maguire.

Though she has never been married or had children, she has six godchildren. In a press conference in 2017, she was asked whether she found it challenging in politics because people prefer politicians with kids and families, she stated that she believed people would judge her on her merit and not on her personal life. Though known as a “workaholic, “she often enjoys opera, books, and wine.