AUSTRALIAN GOVERNMENT

Postnominals

Have you ever seen someone's name with a string of letters/abbreviations after it and wondered what they meant? Most people recognize that MD stands for Medical Doctor and CPA means Certified Public Accountant. Those are called postnominals and consist of abbreviations or initials to indicate that the individual holds a position, office or honour.

Postnominals are written without periods. If a person has more than one, a comma is inserted between them. When there are several postnominals after someone's name, honours are listed first in descending order of precedence, followed by degrees and memberships of learned societies in ascending order.

Postnominal initials associated with honours granted by the Sovereign take precedence over other postnominal initials. The special nature of the Victoria Cross (VC), the George Cross (GC) and the Cross of Valour (CV) requires their postnominals to come before all others. Some obsolete positions are not listed unless recipients who continue to use the postnominals even after the order becomes obsolete are still living.

The list below is in alphabetical order to make it easier to find the information you seek.
See also Postnominals in Order of Precedence

Orders and Decorations	Post-nominal Awarded
	since Oct 1992	before Oct 1992
Australian Antarctic Medal	AAM	AAM
Companion of the Order of Australia	AC	AC
Air Force Cross (UK) 2		AFC
Air Force Medal 2		AFM
Australian Fire Service Medal	AFSM	AFSM
Knight / Dame of the Order of Australia 3		AK / AD
Member of the Order of Australia	AM	AM
Officer of the Order of Australia	AO	AO
Australian Police Medal	APM	APM
Royal Red Cross (2nd Class, Associate) 2, 5		ARRC
Ambulance Service Medal (Australia)	ASM	ASM
British Empire Medal 2		BEM
Bravery Medal (Australia)	BM	BM
Companion of the Order of the Bath 2		CB
Commander of the Order of the British Empire 2		CBE
Conspicuous Gallantry Medal 2, 5		CGM
Conspicuous Gallantry Medal (Flying) 2, 5		CGM
Companion of Honour 2		CH
Companion of the Order of St Michael and St George 2		CMG
Conspicuous Service Cross (Australia)	CSC	CSC
Conspicuous Service Medal	CSM	CSM
Cross of Valour 5	CV	CV
Commander of the Royal Victorian Order	CVO	CVO
Distinguished Conduct Medal 2, 5		DCM
Distinguished Flying Cross (UK) 2		DFC
Distinguished Flying Medal 2		DFM
Distinguished Service Cross (UK) 2, 5		DSC
Distinguished Service Cross (Australia) 5	DSC	DSC
Distinguished Service Medal (UK) 2, 5		DSM
Distinguished Service Medal (Australia) 5	DSM	DSM
Companion of the Distinguished Service Order 2		DSO
Emergency Services Medal (Australia)	ESM	ESM
George Cross 2, 5		GC
Knight / Dame Grand Cross of the Order of the British Empire 2		GBE
Knight / Dame Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath 2		GCB
Knight / Dame Grand Cross of the Order of St Michael and St George 2		GCMG
Knight / Dame Grand Cross of the Royal Victorian Order	GCVO	GCVO
George Medal 2		GM
Companion of the Imperial Service Order 2		ISO
Knight / Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire 2		KBE / DBE
Knight / Dame Commander of the Order of the Bath 2		KCB / DCB
Knight / Dame Commander of the Order of St Michael and St George 2		KCMG / DCMG
Knight / Dame Commander of the Royal Victorian Order	KCVO / DCVO	KCVO / DCVO
Knight / Lady of the Garter	KG / LG	KG / LG
Knight / Lady of the Thistle	KT / LT	KT / LT
Lieutenant of the Royal Victorian Order	LVO	LVO
Member of the Order of the British Empire 2		MBE
Military Cross 2		MC
Medal for Gallantry	MG	MG
Military Medal 2		MM
Member of the Royal Victorian Order	MVO	MVO
Nursing Service Cross (Australia) 5	NSC	NSC
Medal of the Order of Australia	OAM	OAM
Officer of the Order of the British Empire 2		OBE
Order of Merit	OM	OM
Public Service Medal (Australia)	PSM	PSM
Queen's Fire Service Medal for Gallantry 2		QFSM
Queen's Fire Service Medal for Distinguished Service 2		QFSM
Queen's Gallantry Medal 2		QGM
Queen's Police Medal for Gallantry 2		QPM
Queen's Police Medal for Distinguished Service 2		QPM
Reserve Force Decoration	RFD	RFD
Royal Red Cross (1st Class, Member) 2, 5		RRC
Royal Victorian Medal	RVM	RVM
Star of Courage (Australia)	SC	SC
Star of Gallantry 5	SG	SG
Sea Gallantry Medal 2		SGM
Victoria Cross and Victoria Cross for Australia 1	VC	VC
Order of St John 3		Varies
Knight Bachelor 2 (confers title of “Sir” / “Dame”)	no postnominals

Legislators

Member of the Australian House of Representatives	MP
Member of the Legislative Assembly	MLA
Member of the Legislative Council	MLC
Member of the House of Assembly (Tasmania)	MHA

Legal Positions

Queen's Counsel	QC
Senior Counsel	SC
Justice of the Peace	JP
Special Justice (South Australia)	SJ

Vice Regal Appointments

Aide-de-Camp to the Governor-General or State Governor

ADC

Notes:
¹ Refers to both the Imperial Victoria Cross and the Victoria Cross for Australia. Awarding of the
    Imperial Victoria Cross to Australian citizens ended when the Victoria Cross for Australia was
    created as part of the Australian Honours System in 1991. The Australian Victoria Cross has yet
    to be awarded. There have been 96 Australians awarded the Victoria Cross.
² These are Imperial awards. All Imperial awards made to Australian citizens after 5 October 1992 are
   classed as foreign awards, and hence such Australian citizens are not entitled to use the associated
   post-nominal letters. However, those presented with these awards before that date are still permitted
   to use the post-nominal letters.
³ Postnominals within the Order of St John are not recognised as notified in the Governor-General’s
   media release of 14 August 1982.
⁴ Provision for further awards at the Knight & Dame level within the Order of Australia was removed by
  Her Majesty The Queen on 3 March 1986 on the advice of the Prime Minister. Those who have been
  awarded this rank are still permitted to use the title and the post-nominal letters.
⁵ In the period 1975-1991, for Australian citizens and ADF personnel, a number of Imperial awards were
   replaced by Australian awards. See charts below:

For Citizens

Date	Imperial award		Australian award
1975	GC	George Cross	CV	Cross of Valour (Australia)
18 Oct 1989	RRC & ARRC	Royal Red Cross	NSC	Nursing Service Cross (Australia)

For ADF Personnel

Date	Imperial award		Australian award
15 Jan 1991	DCM	Distinguished Conduct Medal	SG	Star of Gallantry
	CGM	Conspicuous Gallantry Medal
	DSO	Distinguished Service Order
1991	DSC	Distinguished Service Cross (UK)	DSC	Distinguished Service Cross (Australia)
1991	DSM	Distinguished Service Medal (UK)	DSM	Distinguished Service Medal (Australia)

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from Wikipedia article postnominal.
For more information visit the Australian government website http://www.itsanhonour.gov.au/

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