Grievance Debate

Fitch, Dr R.

Dr McFETRIDGE (Morphett) (15:18): I rise to tell the house about the sad passing of one of my constituents, Dr Ron Fitch. Dr Fitch died recently, on 20 July this year, aged 105 years. I will tell you why he is called Dr Fitch a little bit later, but Dr Fitch was born Ronald John Fitch on 8 June 1910. He was born into a railway family in Victoria. After growing up in Perth, Dr Fitch spent his railway career working for Western Australian Government Railways, Commonwealth Railways and South Australian Railways, where he became the railway commissioner in 1965.

Ron began his railway career in 1927 with Western Australian Government Railways as a cadet. During this time, he worked in the drawing office of the Way & Works Branch, as well as spending considerable time working in the countryside and at rural depots. The 1930s depression affected Western Australian Government Railways and a large number of staff lost employment due to the lack of work. However, Ron was transferred to Kalgoorlie in 1931 and took up the role of engineering assistant.

Over the next 13 years, he worked around regional Western Australia before returning to Perth in 1944. Ron spent the next four years as engineer in charge of design work for Western Australian railways' gauge standardisation report. In May 1949 Ron left the Western Australian Government Railways after 22 years of service and relocated his family to Port Augusta in South Australia to commence work for the Commonwealth Railways. Ron formally became the Commonwealth Railways chief civil engineer responsible for the Trans-Australian Railway, Central Australia Railway and the North Australia Railway.

During 1951 and 1952, Ron was a member of the royal commission into the route of the proposed new standard gauge railway line from Port Augusta to Leigh Creek. It was during this time that the working relationship between Ron and the Commonwealth Railways Commissioner, PJ Hannaberry, began to break down. Ron tendered his resignation on 8 February 1954 and was appointed assistant to the Railways Commissioner in South Australia.

Still with the South Australian Railways, Ron's role and title changed in 1959 to Deputy Commissioner, essentially the same role but expanded to include stepping into more senior roles when the Railways Commissioner was ill, on leave or suspended from duty. In late 1962, Thomas Playford, the Premier of South Australia, proposed that the narrow gauge line between Port Pirie and Coburn on the New South Wales border be reconstructed to standard gauge. Playford approached the commonwealth government to provide funding for the project. On 19 April 1963 formal approval was granted and allowed construction work to commence immediately. There was a slight change to the plan. Instead of converting the existing narrow gauge track to a standard gauge, a new standard gauge railway was built on the narrow line.

In 1966 Ron became the South Australian Railways Commissioner. The mammoth standard gauge project between Port Pirie and Broken Hill was completed in late 1969. The South Australian Railways planned to hold events at Port Pirie and Peterborough in recognition of those who worked on the project. Unfortunately these official opening events would be marred by a strike of the Australian Federated Union of Locomotive Enginemen and Ron had no option but to cancel these events at short notice.

During his tenure as Deputy Commissioner and Railways Commissioner for South Australian Railways, Ron was an important ally to the fledgling railway preservation scene in South Australia. In 1973, after 46 years of service, Ron retired from the railways. Ron never stopped thinking about the railways. In fact, in 2002 Ron became the oldest PhD recipient in the world. Ron completed a PhD through the University of New South Wales on the railways of South Australia from 1949 to 1975. As a PhD recipient, Ron was always very enthusiastic in talking to other PhD students about their work and saying that, if he could do it as a 92 year old, then the much younger PhD candidates could complete theirs without any concerns at all.

To recognise Ron's efforts over his lifetime and particularly his PhD achievements, Ron became a member of the Engineers of South Australia's Hall of Fame. This occurred in 2008 when Dr Fitch joined such other luminaries as Sir Eric Neal, Malcolm Kinnaird and Dr Andrew Thomas. The numbers of people who have been inducted into the Hall of Fame are very few. The fact that Dr Fitch is in there is impressive, as is the fact that he was able to complete his PhD at 92. He never stopped thinking about his engineering background and was able to prove that engineers can write PhD theses, as one of his lecturers said. He was a wonderful person. I knew him personally over the last 10 or so years and I pass on my condolences to his family. He will be sadly missed. He was a thinker, a mover and a shaker, and he was one of those people we need to talk about.

Time expired.