AS HER first serious achievement as a local government councillor, Mary Fraser lists gaining the support of her otherwise all-male council in North East Victoria to support the Save The Whales campaign.

Pardon me for judging here, but getting an all-male council in a conservative farming area, miles from the sea to swing behind such a campaign requires powers of the super-naturally persuasive kind.

Mary does not give in easily.

"I'm a bit of an arguer," she says. "I'm not as strategic in my goals as I could be. My father-in-law who'd been a councillor (for many years) had an old saying 'it's dogged, what does it!"'

Dogged all right.

Last year, Mary earned an Emeritus Mayor award for serving more than three terms as mayor.

And as such, she's a fair subject in this the Year of Women in Local Government.

She first entered local government by winning a seat on the then Tallangatta Shire Council in 1996.

"I had five children and my youngest was starting school and I thought, what would I do. I was a more traditional farmer's wife.

"I made the cups of tea, cooked for the shearers and was the general dog's body about the place," she says, flouting every feminist rule in her self description. "That suited me. I wasn't interested in doing the farming."

Off to local government Mary went, winning the election on the strength of a campaign to put powerlines underground in Tallangatta, the heart of her municipality and a good 30 minutes' drive from her home and family farm.

"I was one of nine councillors. There was another woman councillor before me."

Her first stint came to an inglorious finish six years later when she was voted out of council, and the council reverted back to the all-male enclave.

Says Mary, now a grandmother of 11 and a much hardier representative, "I was so upset, I didn't take my beating well."

Then she confesses: "I had been shire president and I think I'd become a bit self-important. Losing didn't do me any harm."

A year later Mary was back.

A member of the Women's Electoral Lobby in the 1970s, Mary says she does not focus so much on gender.

She declines to join Australian Local Government Women's Association, which is like a boys' club for girls where women support each other through the rigours of pre-election, election, crisis in council and so on.

Yet it wasn't always easy to put her hand up for power and yes it was intimidating for women to run for council and often to be the only female among men.

Yet she got over that, and her confidence grew.

"I have tried to be equal with men, which is a bit futile. It's still hard times for women in the country to be in local government.

"It's very difficult with a young family and I think in the future we'll see local government seats occupied by older people.

"There really isn't enough incentive for people who are in business to become councillors. Although governments and local government have tried to make it easier for women to be councillors, and they schedule meetings to fit in with school hours, there are just so many other committees and meetings that extend beyond school hours."

Mary says the best advice she received before joining council was from her father-in-law.

"He said you don't need to know about roads and bridges, you just need to be smart enough to ask the right questions and to employ good staff."