Australia Day honours: Yallingup’s Janet Thomas receives Medal of the Order of Australia

Serving as a voice for the voiceless, a passionate Yallingup animal lover has received a national honour for her dedication to creatures big and small. Janet Thomas was one of the hundreds of Australians honoured with a Medal of the Order of Australia this Australia Day, in recognition of her service to animal welfare. An incredibly humble recipient, Ms Thomas told the South Western Times the honour came as a complete “surprise.” “This (recognition) is lovely but it’s certainly not what I do it for,” she said. “I just feel that so many people do such wonderful things, but for me, if you’re in this game, you can’t have an ego,” she said. “It’s just years and years of hard work, lots of knockbacks along the way.” With a love for animals from a young age, Ms Thomas founded Animal Aid Abroad in 2007, when she was working in Egypt as a teacher. Disheartened by the treatment of working animals after an school excursion to the local zoo, she said she “couldn’t help” but help. “It just took me aback,” she said. “I was in the city of Alexandria . . . and just bit by bit, just became more and more aware of what was going on. “It just got to a point where I thought, this can’t go on.” Setting up a 24-hour clinic to service street animals, she was set to relocate to Pakistan for her work but chose to stay and continue assisting with the animals. “It was just one of those turning points where I could go home and set up a (proper) charity and get the support I need, so that’s what I did,” she said. In the 16 years that followed, AAA grew rapidly to span across Tanzania, India, Zimbabwe, Zambia and Indonesia, Israel, the region of Kurdistan, and Afghanistan. Assisting non-profit organisations, Ms Thomas helped to establish a variety of clinics and sanctuaries to help rehabilitate donkeys, camels, equines and Shepherd dogs in these 12 countries. Now teaching in the South West, she hopes to encourage the next generation to be considerate of their furry friends, saying kindness can go a long way. “All I try to teach is kindness,” she said. “Reminding children ‘has your puppy or the dog got water?’, because in Australia, it’s completely different. “Basic kindness, and caring wherever I can, just to keep them aware. “They don’t have a voice, so we have to do everything we can do to care for them and fight for them.”