Monday, 16 June 2025
Government House, Sydney
Her Excellency the Honourable Margaret Beazley AC KC, Governor of New South Wales

Bujari gamarruwa

Diyn Babana Gamarada Gadigal Ngura

Welcome everyone to Government House, as I greet you in the language of the Gadigal of the Eora Nation, the Traditional Owners of these lands and waterways. I pay my respect to their Elders, past, present, and future.

In thinking about those whom we are honouring tonight, it occurred to me that the word ‘cancer’ can provoke quite different—indeed opposite—meanings, depending on whether, like Eddy, one of tonight’s award recipients, you know personally the pain and loss of cancer, or, like the researchers, are focussed on unravelling its mysteries.

In thinking about this, I wondered whether there was a word in the English Language that referred to something which has two different meanings or senses. 

As it turned out, there is. The word is ’contranym’.

A contranym is often referred to as a Janus word, a reference to the Roman god Janus. Depicted with two faces looking in opposite directions, he is known as the god of endings, transitions and beginnings. The month of January is named in his honour, as the old year is left behind and the new year begins.

That, it seemed to me, captured much about tonight.

There are those who have suffered loss and sadness because cancer has taken the life of a loved one. Eddy, having fallen on that side of the cancer story, with his determination and generosity has raised countless dollars towards research so that there could be an end to the pain, the loss, and the sadness. Likewise with Adam, another award recipient, who wants to see a transition from a cancer-affected community, to one where treatments might not only ameliorate cancer’s effects, but also one day, prevent and cure it entirely.

Then there is the other face of Janus, as cancer research looks to the future of new discoveries, methodologies, and technologies that will change the cancer story. Tonight, we have with us 3 researchers who are committed to doing exactly that.

The impact of these 2 groups, coming from those different perspectives, but working towards the same objective, is powerful. Without the one, there really can’t be the other—just like the two faces of Janus, each an aspect of the same powerful god.

Cure Cancer has been enabling this impact now for 58 years,^[1] raising $76 million and providing seed funding for more than 570 research projects across every cancer type, with an emphasis on supporting early career researchers. The results already included earlier detection, more personalised treatments, and better outcomes for people with cancer.

This year alone, Cure Cancer has helped fund 11 projects tackling lung, blood, bowel, and breast cancers, neuroblastoma, sarcoma, melanoma, and metastatic disease. Each $100,000 grant provided represents around 1,300 hours of laboratory time, often leveraged ten-fold in follow-on investment.

Tonight, we celebrate 3 researchers and their achievements. You will hear their citations shortly. Each is a snapshot of years of dedicated work seeking answers to cancer’s many puzzles. Your drive, your application of first-class scientific method, your expertise, your bold and innovative brilliance, is not only profoundly inspirational but also has borne, and will long continue to bring, real and lasting change to the lives of so many. 

To Eddy and Adam, and Cure Cancer’s many other supporters, without your generosity much of this research would not be happening.

To all recipients: Thank you. You enable hope for all affected by cancer, present and future.

As Patron, I thank the entire Cure Cancer team, whether a Board or staff member, volunteer, supporter, past and present, for your efforts.

[1] Cure Cancer was founded in 1967 when two families came together to form a research trust in memory of loved ones lost to cancer: information provided by Cure Cancer.