Ian Yates is Chief Executive of COTA Australia, the national peak body for COTAs (Councils on the Ageing) in each State and Territory of Australia. Ian was appointed CE of COTA SA in June 1989 and has played national leadership roles in COTA since 2002.

COTAs are the peak aged consumer organisation in each state and territory and nationally, with thousands of organisational members representing over 500,000 seniors, plus 30,000 individual members.

Ian serves on a wide variety of federal government and aged care sector national bodies. He is a member of the Federal Government’s Aged Care Financing Authority; the Aged Care Sector Committee and the Aged Care Quality Advisory Council of the Aged Care Quality Agency and the Department of Health’s ACFI Monitoring Group. Ian is the COTA representative on the National Aged Care Alliance and its Sponsors Group. He is a Board member of the Aged Rights Advocacy Service (ARAS) in SA.

Beyond aged care Ian is a member of the Consumer Advisory Panel to the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC), a Director of Livable Housing Australia, and a member of the Advisory Board of the ARC Centre of Excellence in Population Ageing Research (CEPAR).

Ian is Chair of the Management Committee of the Australasian Journal on Ageing (AJA) and serves as a Director of COTA’s Insurance and Membership Services Ltd (IMS).

Ian has previously been a Director of the Aged Care Standards and Accreditation Agency and has served on the Consumer Consultative Committee to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) and the Australian Energy Regulator (AER), the National Forum on Mature Age Participation, and the former Ageing Consultative Committee to the Federal Minister for Ageing.

Over the last decade Ian has been Deputy Chancellor of Flinders University and Chair of its Strategic Resources Committee and various other Committees; Chair of the Cancer Council SA and a Director of the Cancer Council Australia; Deputy Chair of the Repatriation General Hospital in SA; Deputy Chair of the SA Council of Social Service; Board Member of the Southern Adelaide Health Service; Board Member of the Flinders Medical Centre; and a member of the SA Government’s Health Performance Council.

Ian holds a BA from Flinders University; is a Member of the Australian Institute of Company Directors; is an Honorary Doctor and Emeritus Deputy Chancellor of Flinders University; and was awarded Membership in the Order of Australia (AM) in June 2005.