Lesley Maria Hall OAM (27 November 1954 – 19 October 2013) was a disability advocate, arts administrator, writer and activist.
In 1981 Hall staged a protest at the Miss Australia Quest, a beauty pageant held as a fundraiser for the organisation then known as the Spastic Society.
[1] In relation to the contests she stated:[4]We are challenging the notion of beauty and we reject the charity ethic... Beauty quests that raise money in the name of disabled people do us a double disservice.
Through patronising fund raising activities, the community is shown again and again that we are "inferior" people.
The abolition of beauty quests will be a significant step towards this end.Hall was a member of the Melbourne Workers Theatre,[5] and worked as an arts officer for the Darebin City Council.