Page 1520 - Week 04 - Thursday, 7 April 2011
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national aspects of our city. He was also a strong supporter of moves to see federal funding to commemorate the city’s centenary in 2013.
This article perhaps typifies Alan Fitzgerald’s passion for the city that he loved and lived in for most of his life, a city that he believed was unfairly criticised as merely the home of politicians and bureaucrats. Through his humour and insight he managed to portray Canberra in a truly human light, a city that we can all be proud of.
In joining with other members, I extend my sincere condolences to Alan’s wife, Maria, his sons Dominic and Julian, his six grandchildren, his daughter-in-law, Jacqueline—grandson Patrick in particular is here today—and his many friends.
MR DOSZPOT (Brindabella): I thank the Chief Minister for his condolence motion on the death of Alan Fitzgerald. The key facts of Alan’s life have already been covered by Mr Stanhope, Mr Seselja and Ms Hunter, and today I wish to focus on the man from both private and public perspectives. In this task I have been assisted by the thoughts of some of those who knew him best, his two sons, who both delivered fine eulogies at his funeral at Sacred Heart Church, Pearce on Tuesday, as well as my own memories of Alan. First and foremost, Alan loved his family—wife Maria, sons Dominic and Julian, daughters-in-law Karina and Jacqueline, and six grandsons—Nicholas, Timothy, Samuel, Hugh, Patrick and Daniel.
I am pleased that his wife, Maria, son Julian and his wife Jacqueline and son Patrick have been able to join us in the gallery here today. To them I pass on my deep condolences on Alan’s passing. In his eulogy, Dominic remarked that Alan’s family was the centre of his world. Alan’s love for Maria was deep and profound and clearly reciprocated in a remarkably successful marriage which, at 49 years, lasted nearly a lifetime.
Julian described Alan as his abba, his alpha and his omega which, in Latin and Greek, means that Alan was his father, his beginning and his end. He was a strong moral force in the life of his sons. He was always there for them, and I know how proud he was of their achievements. Alan was passionate about everything he did and left a fine record of achievement as a journalist, author, satirist and politician.
He was a man of great courage who never resiled from expressing his firmly held views on the subject of the day. In Julian’s words, he was driven to do what was right, not what was popular, and this did not come at times without its costs. As I mentioned to this house in my adjournment speech on Tuesday night, Alan was a high profile and committed constitutional monarchist and, since its foundation, he was the local convener of Australians for Constitutional Monarchy.
Alan was also prominent in establishing the National Press Club, where he served two terms as president from 1969 to 1971. Despite his satirical comments about Canberra, he loved the place with a rare passion. In his 2001 autobiography Some of What I Have Done and Failed to Do he suggested that “my life had been shaped by living in the national capital in ways that I could not have imagined possible had I lived elsewhere”.
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