12 Facts About Pat Hills

Patrick Darcy Hills was a New South Wales politician.

Pat Hills was educated at Marist Brothers High School, Darlinghurst and was apprenticed as an electrical engineer.

Pat Hills was an alderman on Sydney City Council from 1948 to 1956 and Lord Mayor of Sydney from 1953 to 1956, during which time he was fooled into carrying a fake Olympic torch.

Pat Hills was elected to the New South Wales Legislative Assembly as the member for Phillip in 1954, representing the Labor Party; he held the seat till its abolition in 1981.

Pat Hills was Minister for Local Government in the cabinet of Premier Robert Heffron.

Pat Hills has the vice, for a politician, of not suffering fools gladly and it is this that feeds a habit of arrogance which has made him many unnecessary enemies.

Pat Hills did however contest for the deputy premiership, and was successful 33 votes to 19 against health minister Bill Sheahan.

Pat Hills has been accused of sabotaging the 1948 Cumberland County Plan for Sydney, "flogging the green belt out the back door before the ink was dry".

Pat Hills served as a member of the Sydney Cricket Ground and Sports Ground Trust from July 1961 to December 1989, and was Chairman of the Trust during its significant expansion period from 1977 to 1989.

Until John Robertson's resignation in 2014, Pat Hills was the only New South Wales Labor Leader not to have been premier since 1923.

Pat Hills died in Sydney and was cremated with his ashes interred at Northern Suburbs Memorial Gardens.

Pat Hills was made an Officer of the Order of Australia in the 1988 Australia Day Honours.