Vincent William John FitzGerald (born 13 July 1944) is a former senior Australian public servant, now a private consultant.

Early life

Vince FitzGerald was schooled at St Augustine's College, Cairns. FitzGerald graduated from the University of Queensland in 1969 with a Bachelor of Economics with first class honours in Econometrics, and a University Medal.

Career

FitzGerald joined the

Australian Public Service The Australian Public Service (APS) is the federal civil service of the Commonwealth of Australia responsible for the public administration, public policy, and public services of the departments and executive and statutory agencies of the G ...

in 1969 as a research officer with the

Australian Bureau of Statistics The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) is the independent statutory agency of the Australian Government responsible for statistical collection and analysis and for giving evidence-based advice to federal, state and territory governments ...

. In 1985, FitzGerald was appointed a Deputy Secretary in the

Department of Trade Department may refer to: * Departmentalization, division of a larger organization into parts with specific responsibility Government and military *Department (administrative division), a geographical and administrative division within a country, ...

. He was promoted to

Secretary A secretary, administrative professional, administrative assistant, executive assistant, administrative officer, administrative support specialist, clerk, military assistant, management assistant, office secretary, or personal assistant is a w ...

of the Department in March 1986. In July 1987, FitzGerald was shifted to the newly created

Department of Employment, Education and Training The Department of Employment, Education and Training (DEET) was an Australian government department that existed between July 1987 and March 1996. Scope Information about the department's functions and/or government funding allocation ...

. FitzGerald left the role in 1989 to join the firm Allen Consulting, a higher-paid job in the private sector. As a consultant, FitzGerald was the architect of the compulsory

superannuation A pension (, from Latin ''pensiō'', "payment") is a fund into which a sum of money is added during an employee's employment years and from which payments are drawn to support the person's retirement from work in the form of periodic payments ...

scheme introduced by the Keating government in 1992. Superannuation was later refined in response to FitzGerald's June 1993 publication ''National Savings: A Report to the Treasurer'' in which he identified the importance of national saving, and recommended ways in which national saving could be increased. In 1995,

Paul Keating Paul John Keating (born 18 January 1944) is an Australian former politician and unionist who served as the 24th prime minister of Australia from 1991 to 1996, holding office as the leader of the Australian Labor Party (ALP). He previously serv ...

called FitzGerald a "sour ex-bureaucrat" and claimed that FitzGerald had wanted to be Secretary of the

Treasury A treasury is either *A government department related to finance and taxation, a finance ministry. *A place or location where treasure, such as currency or precious items are kept. These can be state or royal property, church treasure or in p ...

but was upset to have never made it. This was a response to a criticism FitzGerald made to aspects of a Keating Budget.

Awards

In June 2016, FitzGerald was made an Officer of the Order of Australia for distinguished services to business through executive and advisory roles in economic policy development, public administration and financial management organisations, and to the community.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:FitzGerald, Vince 1944 births Living people Secretaries of the Australian Government Education Department Harvard University alumni Officers of the Order of Australia University of Queensland alumni