Vince Gair - Later Life

Later Life

Gair took up his post in Ireland. During his tenure, he got into numerous rows with the Irish Department of Foreign Affairs and other ambassadors. Several female staffers resigned to protest his frequently inappropriate (and often alcohol-induced) behavior. He also frequently criticised Opposition Leader Billy Snedden. After the Fraser government took office after the 1975 election, Foreign Minister Andrew Peacock had Gair recalled on 21 January 1976, not for political reasons, but because he was unfit for diplomacy. Gair returned to Brisbane, and died aged 79 on 11 November 1980, the fifth anniversary of the dismissal of the Whitlam government. He was honoured with a state funeral and was buried in Nudgee Cemetery.

Read more about this topic:  Vince Gair

Famous quotes containing the word life:

    Like children, the elders are a burden. But unlike children, they offer no hope or promise. They are a weight and an encumbrance and a mirror of our own mortality. It takes a person of great heart to see past this fact and to see the wisdom the elders have to offer, and so serve them out of gratitude for the life they have passed on to us.
    Kent Nerburn (20th century)

    There is something else which has the power to awaken us to the truth. It is the works of writers of genius.... They give us, in the guise of fiction, something equivalent to the actual density of the real, that density which life offers us every day but which we are unable to grasp because we are amusing ourselves with lies.
    Simone Weil (1909–1943)