Name Harry Giese | Died 2000 | |
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Born 1913 Greenbushes, Western Australia Other names H.C. Giese, Harry Christian Giese Occupation Australian administrator, public servant and community leader Books Planning a Program for Aborigines in the 1950s | ||
Harry C Giese AM MBE (born 1913, Western Australia, died 2000, Darwin, Northern Territory) administered Australian federal government policy for the people of the Northern Territory under Prime Ministers including Robert Menzies and Harold Holt and Ministers including Paul Hasluck.
Biography and Career
Giese was a third-generation descendant of a German family who migrated to Australia in the 1870s. In 1954, after senior public service jobs in Western Australia and Queensland, he moved to Darwin as the Director of Welfare in the Northern Territory Administration. He was the longest-serving member of the Northern Territory Legislative Council, from 1954–73. In 1978, after Territory self-government, he became the first Northern Territory Ombudsman.
As founding Chairman of the NT Committee of the Menzies Foundation he was instrumental in the establishment of the Menzies School of Health Research, serving on its Board of Governors and as Deputy Chairman from 1985–95. He was made a Member of the Order of Australia and an Honorary Fellow of the University of Sydney.
Giese was Foundation President and honorary Life Member of numerous community service and sporting organisations, including the Royal Life Saving Society Australia, Darwin Probus Club, Darwin Disaster Welfare Council after the 1974 destruction of Cyclone Tracy, and the Institute of Public Administration.