Northern Metropolitan MLC Anasina Gray-Barberio near her electorate office in Brunswick.
Mark Phillips
Tuesday, August 12, 2025
WHEN Anasina Gray-Barberio looks around the chamber of Victoria’s Legislative Council, she sees no-one who resembles her.
As Victoria’s – and possibly Australia’s – first female Member of Parliament from a Pacific Islander background, Samoan-born Gray-Barberio feels a unique responsibility to make sure her community is seen by politicians and decision-makers.
And every time she speaks, she knows she is representing not just her Northern Metropolitan electorate, but all 80,000 people with Pasifika ancestry in the state.
“When you’re the first, of course, you have responsibility to make sure that you are bringing in the lived experience of the community; the challenges but also opportunities for the community,” she says.
“I really care about not just my community, the Pacific community, but all marginalised communities, oppressed communities, underserved communities who are not often invited to express their experiences when it comes to decision making.”
Gray-Barberio, 43, is still making herself known to her electorate after she was chosen late last year to replace her high-profile predecessor Samantha Ratnam when she resigned from Parliament to run for the seat of Wills at the federal election in May.
She has retained Ratnam’s electorate office in Albert Street in Brunswick, although her heart lies further north in Broadmeadows where she grew up after migrating to Australia from Samoa with her family three decades ago.
The experience of growing up in a minority in a suburb that has often been neglected by governments and has a myriad of socio-economic disadvantages has shaped Gray-Barberio’s career as a social worker, founder of a community organisation, and now state parliamentarian.
Gray-Barberio was 13 when the family moved from the Samoan capital Apia to pursue better opportunities in Australia. Samoa is a tiny archipelago in the middle of the Pacific Ocean about 4000 km north-east of Australia with a population of a little over 200,000.
Gray-Barberio is the second oldest of six children. Her father, Paul, played rugby for Samoa, and a younger brother, Tala, is a professional rugby player in France who represented Australia in Rugby 7s.
She said she experienced racism growing up in Australia and desperate to fit in for for several years in her late teens she attempted to hide her Pasifka ancestry, before re-embracing it after coming to recognise “your culture is your strength”. These days, she celebrates her heritage by wearing a sei flower every day in her hair above her left ear.
Having been brought up with a strong sense of social justice, she studied social work at university before working as a community organiser. In 2023, the mother of two young boys founded a community organisation, Engage Pasifika, which advocated to overcome health inequities experienced by Pacific Islander people.
It was Ratnam, who Gray-Barberio describes as a “hero”, who first lit the fire in her that one day she could pursue a political career.
They formed a friendship after first meeting through a multicultural women’s taskforce against family violence.
“She’s a hero of mine, [and] for most women of colour,” Gray-Barberio says.
“I mean, you look at the composition of the state Parliament, you can tell me how many women of colour [there are]. There’s nowhere near enough. So we’ve got, you know, representation of gender, but now we need to work on representation of diversity to properly reflect what our communities look like. Because right now it’s still very white”
But well before she met Ratnam, Gray-Barberio’s earliest hero and role model was her mother, Taualogomai, a retired early childhood educator.
“I come from a long line of strong Pacific women who have always advocated for women’s equity, like my grandmother, growing up in the islands, always fought for women’s voices to be included in important conversations.
“When I was a teenager in Broadmeadows, my mum not only fought for opportunities for our family, but for Pacific Island families and that came to things like early childcare.
“She also understood very well the challenges that families faced, you know, when they’re migrating to a new country and English is their second language navigating complex systems.”
Gray-Barberio says she has always voted for the Greens and was drawn to the party by an alignment of values, including a shared concern about the impact of climate change in the Pacific.
“I’m a Pacific Island woman, and our people in our region are on the front lines of the climate emergency, and that’s really important for me to be able to bring the voices of our Pacific people to the discussion and the debate around how governments can take more accountability and responsibility when it comes to climate justice, and asking those questions like, whose voices are at the table, but also whose voices are missing from that political discussion around climate resilience and so on.”
Upon arriving in Parliament, Gray-Barberio was handed a heavy load of portfolios, including multiculturalism, women, gender equality and family violence, and early childhood education.
As an MP, she likens her role to being an advocate for communities who are under-represented — something she shares with Labor’s Sheena Watt, a Yorta Yorta woman who is the Legislative Council’s only Aboriginal member.
“Our multicultural communities, as well as our First Nations communities, I don’t believe have access to fair and equitable opportunities, and that’s from my own experiences growing up in Broady but also the work that I’ve undertaken and really seen first hand of how the system just perpetuates this kind of second class way of treating Victorians … When I have those opportunities to speak in Parliament, it’s bringing in those experiences that everyday people have.”
She cites as an example her role on a Parliamentary committee that is inquiring into the government decision to demolish and redevelop the 44 public housing towers in Melbourne.
She said it had been “absolutely heartbreaking” to hear accounts from public housing residents – many of them from a migrant background – about their experiences since the decision was announced in late-2023.
“It’s just been horrific, but also it’s been really affirming and empowering to sit there and watch public housing residents speak truth to power and be able to express to us as the committee what this experience has been like for them.”
Having been chosen to fill a vacancy in the Upper House, Gray-Barberio is yet to face an election.
She is unfazed by the Greens’ poor performance in the federal election, which included its leader Adam Bandt losing his seat of Melbourne.
She says Ratnam came close to winning Wills for the first time and made inroads in the culturally diverse northern part of the electorate which she believes will have an impact at next year’s state election.
“I’m not worried. I’m actually really hopeful. Going into the state election, we’ve got a lot of work to do, and you know, that’s fine, because I’m a hard worker.
“I’m not afraid of hard work there, and what that involves, and the deep engagement that comes with making those connections in community is really important as well. So I’m actually looking forward to the state election.”
“When I have those opportunities to speak in Parliament, it’s bringing in those experiences that everyday people have,” Gray-Barberio says.
A recent visit to a high school in her electorate that has a large Pasifika student population reminded Gray-Barberio once again of the extra responsibility she bears.
“They put on a big dance for me. They gave me flower necklaces up to my neck.
“It was a reminder that here are some young people who are going to be voting members of our community in the next couple of years, showing them to go for your dreams, but also to be proud to say where you’re from.
“And in all honesty … when we had moved to Melbourne, it was such a massive culture shock for me. I was with students from different backgrounds that I had never heard of before, and you know, being 13, 14, I rejected parts of my culture because I wanted so desperately to fit in and belong, and thought that, okay, well, in order to belong, you had to silence parts of who you are and your identity.
“It takes time to recognise and have the confidence that, wait a minute, your culture is your strength, and your culture is a big part of who you are, and not to be ashamed of that, just embrace it.
“And that’s what I’m doing in Parliament that hasn’t changed.”
