2025 Ngalaya Ball and First Nations Law Awards

Ngalaya
Sep 2
2 min read

Updated: Sep 4

First Nations lawyers, law students, family, colleagues and friends all gathered for a deadly night of celebration on Gadigal Country for the 4th annual Ngalaya Ball and First Nations Law Awards at Doltone House Hyde Park.

Mark Holden, who has been a Director of Ngalaya since 2012, emceed the evening with his signature style. He opened the night with an Acknowledgement of Gadigal Country, and recognised the passing of the late Uncle Paul Coe and Bill Buckley OAM. With a minute's silence, Ngalaya members and supporters paid their respects to these two men for their generational contributions to Indigenous communities, and mob in the law.

Ngalaya's Executive Director, Jason O'Neil, spoke briefly about Ngalaya's history and the importance of feeling connected and supported by our growing community. He highlighted some of the challenges still faced by Indigenous people entering law school, the profession, and the legal academy. He also acknowledged the trailblazing Indigenous lawyers who opened doors and paved paths for our people over the last 50 years.

First Nations Law Awards 2025

We were thrilled to present the fourth iteration of Ngalaya's First Nations Law Awards, our annual celebration of the contributions made by Indigenous lawyers, advocates, researchers and law students to the profession and our communities.

The recipients of this year's awards were:

First Nations Lawyer of the Year: Damian Beaufils
First Nations Legal Researcher of the Year: Dr Kirsten Gray
First Nations Senior Law Student of the Year: Amos Taylor
First Nations Junior Law Student of the Year: Maikiira Barber

Thanks to Herbert Smith Freehills Kramer for sponsoring the Junior & Senior Law Student of the Year awards.

Ngalaya Lifetime Achievement Award

This year the Ngalaya Board announced a special Lifetime Achievement Award to recognise the incredible contributions of Prof Kevin Williams over decades, all the way back to his co-founding Ngalaya in 1997 with Cal Martin and the role he played in supporting the establishment of the UNSW Pre-Law Program.

Acknowledgments - Ngalaya Ball Sponsors and supporters

Ngalaya wishes to sincerely thank our sponsors and supporters of the 2025 Ngalaya Ball, for helping us to make the event a success and accessible to everyone.