Graeme Samuel was appointed as acting chairman of the ACCC on 1 July 2003 and then as chairman for a five-year term from 1 August 2003. He was appointed for a further three-year term on 1 August 2008. He is also an associate member of the Australian Communications and Media Authority.

Before Mr Samuel’s appointment he was president of the National Competition Council, chairman of the Melbourne and Olympic Parks Trust, a commissioner of the Australian Football League, a member of the board of the Docklands Authority and a director of Thakral Holdings Limited. He relinquished all these offices to take up his position with the ACCC.

Mr Samuel is a past president of the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, a past chairman of the Playbox Theatre Company and Opera Australia, a former trustee of the Melbourne Cricket Ground Trust and former chairman of the Inner and Eastern Health Care Network. Until the early 1990s he pursued a professional career in law and investment banking, from which he retired to assume a number of roles in public service and company directorships.

Mr Samuel holds a Bachelor of Laws (Melbourne) and Master of Laws (Monash). In 2010 he was appointed a Companion in the General Division of the Order of Australia.

Michael Schaper was appointed as a deputy chair of the ACCC in May 2008 for a five‑year term.

Before Dr Schaper’s appointment to the ACCC he was the Australian Capital Territory Small Business Commissioner, Dean of Murdoch University Business School in Western Australia and President of the Small Enterprise Association of Australia and New Zealand. He has also been a member of the board of directors of the International Council for Small Business, served as head of the School of Business at Bond University and held the foundation professorial chair in entrepreneurship and small business at the University of Newcastle. Before that, he was a senior lecturer at Curtin University responsible for the university’s entrepreneurship degree programs.

Between 2001 and 2003 Dr Schaper held two international posts as a visiting professor, while serving as an adjunct professor at both Curtin University and the University of Canberra.

In addition to his extensive academic career, Dr Schaper has worked as a professional small business adviser and owned a number of new business start-ups. The author or co-author of eight business management books, he has been a regular columnist in a number of national magazines, newspapers and journals on business issues. He has also worked as a policy adviser at both state and federal levels.

Dr Schaper holds a PhD and a Master of Commerce from Curtin University, as well as a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Western Australia.

Peter Kell was appointed as a deputy chair of the ACCC for a five-year term commencing in August 2008.

Before joining the ACCC, Mr Kell was chief executive of CHOICE (the Australian Consumers Association) and a board member of the global consumer organisation Consumers International. He has extensive experience in advancing consumer and market reform issues in Australia and internationally.

Mr Kell previously worked at the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC), which he joined in 1998 when it took on a significantly expanded role in consumer and investor protection in financial services. He served as ASIC’s Executive Director of Consumer Protection and as its New South Wales Regional Commissioner until 2004.

Earlier in his career Mr Kell was a policy adviser in the Commonwealth Department of Finance.

Mr Kell has a Bachelor of Arts (Hons) in Economics from the University of Sydney.

Sarah Court was appointed to the ACCC in May 2008 for a five‑year period.

Before joining the ACCC Ms Court was a senior executive lawyer and director at the Australian Government Solicitor. Her roles there included director of the Adelaide and Darwin AGS offices, director of AGS’s national tax practice and national client service manager for the ACCC.

Ms Court holds a Bachelor of Arts (Jurisprudence), a Bachelor of Law from the University of Adelaide and a Graduate Diploma in Legal Practice from the Australian National University.

Edward Willett was appointed to the ACCC in 2003, and began a further five-year term in May 2008.

Before Mr Willett’s initial appointment to the ACCC he was the inaugural executive director of the National Competition Council for seven years.

Before that he was an assistant commissioner with the Industry Commission and helped develop the role of the Commonwealth Department of Industry, Science and Technology in business law and regulation. He spent three years as deputy head of the Office of Regulation Review and was involved in other Industry Commission inquiry work and research.

He also spent three years with the New Zealand Ministry of External Relations and Trade as an adviser on international economics and trade, and eight years as an economist with the Department of Defence.

Mr Willett has a Bachelor of Economics, a Bachelor of Laws and a Diploma of International Law with distinction, all from the Australian National University.

Joe Dimasi was appointed to the ACCC in November 2008 for a period of five years.

Before his appointment Mr Dimasi was the executive general manager of the Regulatory Affairs Division of the ACCC, a position he had occupied since 1996. Before that, he was an assistant commissioner of the Industry Commission (now the Productivity Commission).

He has been a senior economist in a number of organisations, including the Victorian government departments of the Treasury, Premier and Cabinet and Business.

Mr Dimasi has a Bachelor of Economics and a Masters in Economics from Monash University.

Jill Walker was appointed as a Commissioner of the ACCC in August 2009 for a five-year term.

Dr Walker is the chair of the ACCC’s Mergers Review Committee as well as a member of the Enforcement Committee and Adjudication.

Dr Walker has extensive experience in the fields of trade practices and antitrust economics. Before joining the ACCC, she was a member of the Australian Competition Tribunal and worked as an economic consultant for LECG Ltd. Dr Walker has also worked for the Network Economics Consulting Group and CRA International. Dr Walker has also been a member of the South Australian Government’s panel of expert assessors assisting the District Court in hearing appeals under the Essential Services Commission Act 2002 and the Gas Pipelines Access (South Australia) Act 1997.

Dr Walker has previously been employed as an economic adviser by the ACCC and its predecessors, the Prices Surveillance Authority and the Trade Practices Commission. During this time Dr Walker provided advice on significant cases, investigations, and authorisations.

Dr Walker holds a Bachelor of Arts in Economics and a PhD in Land Economy from the University of Cambridge. She also holds a Master’s degree in Economics from the University of Massachusetts.

Andrew Reeves was appointed as the part-time state/territory member of the AER for a five-year term from 17 July 2008. Before his appointment, he was commissioner of the Tasmanian Government Prices Oversight Commission and regulator of the Tasmanian electricity supply industry, responsible for technical and economic regulation (including performance standards and prices for distribution services and retail tariffs). In this capacity he was an associate member of the ACCC.

Mr Reeves is a qualified engineer, with postgraduate qualifications in economics.

Steve Edwell was appointed by the Ministerial Council on Energy as inaugural chair of the AEER, a position he has held since 23 May 2005.

Mr Edwell has over 15 years experience in reform of utilities, in particular electricity and water, where he has driven a number of comprehensive reform projects, and has worked in both the public and private sectors.

From 1988 to 1998 he worked in Queensland Treasury, holding the position of Assistant Under-Treasurer Structural Reform. Subsequently he undertook various contracted positions in the utilities sector and acted as a consultant on a range of electricity and water matters, specialising in large-scale reform implementation.

Immediately before this appointment, Mr Edwell worked for the Western Australian Government, leading the implementation of comprehensive electricity reform in that state. He was also the chief executive officer of the Queensland Electricity Reform Unit, which implemented a range of electricity reforms culminating in Queensland joining the National Electricity Market. His other assignments included being commissioned by the Queensland Government to implement the Council of Australian Governments water reforms and heading the Queensland Office of Energy.

Mr Edwell has a commerce/economics degree from the University of New South Wales and an MBA from the University of Queensland.

Edward Willett is a member of the ACCC. (See ACCC members’ biographies (on pp. 88–92) for more information.)

Part IIIAA of the Trade Practices Act 1974 provides that one of the members of the AER must also be a member of the ACCC.