Day 17 – Valourous Val, Our Kind Warrior

Day 17 – Valourous Val, Our Kind Warrior

The Worst Of Them All, the Policeman said.

Kindness sometimes requires standing up for what is right, with courage.

In 1977, when former nun Val Edwards was arrested as one of the leaders of protests against the Bjelke-Peterson Government’s overreach in trying to ban ….. protests, a policeman referred to her as “the worst of them all”.

Her legal representative at the time was Wayne Goss, who became Premier from 1989 to 1996.


Val’s Priestly brother Don’d his white collar
late one night to rescue her from the clink.
“The Worst of Them All”
she was called of 418 naughties
loaded into paddy wagons that Brisbane night.

It was 1977 when a religious Premier
who thought he was God,
ruled people couldn’t say “no” to him.
It was sweetly innocent Val, a former nun,
who fiercely roused said a megaphone NO to Joh.

Despite his power, hers was a great kindness.
Strength and courage speaking up
for the voiceless against injustice meted out
by those who cared less for anything
but power and the rights of the privileged.


What a privilege to count her my kind friend. Over time Queensland police were to arrest around 2,000 protesters. The Government’s plan failed.

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