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Professor
new head
of Foreign
Affairs
By BILL GOODALL
Professor Stuart Harris, professor of
resource economics at the ANU, has
been appointed Secretary of the De-
partment of Foreign Affairs.
His appointment by the Minister for
Foreign Affairs, Mr Hayden, was an-
nounced by the Prime Minister, Mr
Hawke, yesterday after endorsement
by Cabinet.
Professor Harris succeeds Mr Peter
Henderson, who leaves the position
tomorrow after five years, but will not
take over until after he returns from
an overseas visit later this month.
In the meantime, the present acting
deputy secretary, Mr Geoff Miller, will
be acting secretary.
Mr Hawke also announced yester-
day the appointment of Mr Bernard
McKay, Secretary of the NSW Depart-
ment of Health, as head of the Com-
monwealth Department of Health.
He succeeds Mr Laurie Willett, who
is to assist in establishing the Merit
Protection and Review Agency as in-
terim director.
The appointment of Professor
Harris, who is director of the Centre
for Resource and Environmental Stud-
ies at the ANU, is in tune with Mr
Hayden's intention to strengthen the
economic element in a reorganised
department.
He sifted through a large field of
candidates from within and outside
the department before making his de-
cision.
The announcement of the decision
came not only just two days before Mr
Henderson's departure but also two
days before Mr Hayden leaves Aus-
tralia on visits to Portugal, Central
America and the United States.
In the US he will attend and address
in New York the forthcoming General
Assembly at the United Nations,
where Australia's Ambassador is Mr
Richard Woolcott, widely tipped at the
weekend to be given the job.
Professor Harris, 53, is of course not
a newcomer to the senior ranks of the
Public Service. He was deputy secre-
tary of the Department of Overseas
Trade from 1972-75 and was director
of the Bureau of Agricultural
Economics from 1967-72.
He also was economics adviser to
the Government of Colombia in
1967-68 and back in Canberra an
economics adviser to the Senate For-
eign Affairs and Defence Committee
in 1979.
In 1978 he was senior research
associate with the Trade Policy Re-
search Centre in London, and in 1982
visiting professor at the Royal In-
stitute of International Affairs there.
He had received his education in
London before taking an honours
degree in economics at Sydney Uni-
versity and his Ph.D, specialising in
international trade, at the ANU.
He was made a professor of resource
economics in 1975 and director of the
Centre for Resource and Environmen-
tal Studies in 1982.
Professor Harris is chairman of the
Australia-Japan Research Committee,
task-force co-ordinator of the Pacific
Economic Co-Operation Conference
and a member of the Antarctic Re-
search Policy Advisory Committee.
The new head of the Department of
Health, Mr McKay, will take up his
appointment on Monday.
Mr McKay, 44, was director, admin-
istration, of the Northern Territory
Health Services, Commonwealth De-
partment of Health, in 1971-72 and
assistant director, planning and ex-
ecutive services, ACT Health Services,
from 1972-74.
He was then regional director,
North Coast Region, of the NSW
Health Commission for six years until
1980, when he was appointed chair-
man and chief executive officer of the
South Australian Health Commission.
He returned to NSW to take up his
present appointment in December
1982.
Mr McKay is an executive member
of the Standing Committee of Health
Ministers and the Australian Health
Council and a member of the National
Health and Medical Research Council.
Mr Willett, 45, formerly deputy sec-
retary of the Department of Industry
and Commerce, is to be appointed to
statutory positions on the Health In-
surance Commission and the Com-
monwealth Serum Laboratories Com-
mission after his period as interim
director of the Merit Protection and
Review Agency.
The agency is being set up independ-
ent of the Public Service Board to
oversee and administer public-service
statutory appeal and review commit-
tees and to investigate grievances.
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