About Nikki Thompson

I live in Queensland, 80 kms NE of Roma. This is within the SW Health Service District and in Iman Country.

While I love on a cattle property, my working life has been in the arena of health. For decades as a physiotherapist in both public and private areas. I am passionate about the flourishing of rural communities for many reasons. Most Australian land is stewarded by people in rural areas. In this time of increasing climate challenges and biodiversity loss, what happens here has wide ranging impacts.

Healthy people are essential for our land to be well stewarded. Land, food and health go hand in hand and as rural populations diminish, a trend I hope will reverse, it is vital that we have viable health and educational systems in place.

As is a common trend, what I have noticed over the decades is that whilst there have been improvements in so many services, the gaps also continue to widen. Loss of connection and meaning feel to be fuelling the increasing mental health challenges as well as increasing financial pressures.

I believe it is vital to have grass roots, contextual information flowing for good decision making to occur. I recently heard a great quote that we now have so many systems in place where the power is too separated from the pain. A recipe for poor simplistic decisions. Together, we can do better.