Charlie McKillop

Charlie's interest in people and places and her passion for telling their stories make her a perfect fit at the helm of the Queensland Country Hour.

Unashamedly parochial about far north Queensland, Charlie McKillop grew up surrounded by rural industries in Kuranda, Mena Creek and Karumba. She once worked on a barramundi boat in the Gulf of Carpentaria before quickly realising there must be an easier way to make a living, and returning to her journalism studies at the University of Queensland!

After cutting her teeth at regional newspapers in Emerald and Cairns, her passion for local issues prompted a foray into the federal political arena before returning to her journalism roots, this time in broadcast radio.

In the years since Charlie joined the ABC in far north Queensland, she's been a familiar voice on the rural report and her stories have been a mainstay on the Queensland Country Hour covering issues from a devastating banana biosecurity outbreak to the bitter sugar marketing row to the effect of regulatory changes on the fishing fleet.

Her story 'A Duty to be Kind in Halal Slaughter' was recognised by the International Federation of Agricultural Journalists in 2015 as the best in the world in the broadcast audio category; along with several Excellence in Rural Journalism Awards by the Rural Press Club of Queensland. She was also proud to become the inaugural recipient of the LGAQ's 'Bean Lockyer Ticehurst' award for regional journalism for a story examining the implications of Australia's largest marine park in the Coral Sea.

As the presenter of the Queensland Country Hour, Charlie's looking forward to a conversation every lunch hour about the people, communities and industries that make Queensland such a dynamic and great state in which to live and work.