Duncan Kerr

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Duncan James Colquhoun Kerr SC was appointed Parliamentary Secretary for Pacific Island Affairs by Prime Minister Kevin Rudd following the victory of the Australian Labor Party in the November 2007 federal election. Prior to his appointment to Executive Government Kerr was Co-Convenor of the Australian Parliamentary Group for Drug Law Reform, a cross-party group that advocates harm minimisation as being more effective, more cost-efficient and less harmful than zero-tolerance when it comes to dealing with drug use.

Kerr was Minister for Justice 1993-96 and Attorney-General in 1993 and was a member of the Opposition Shadow Ministry from 1996-2001. Following the 2001 election he considered a move to the Tasmanian state parliament but then-leader Simon Crean and the party's central office wanted to prevent a by-election so this did not proceed. Born February 26, 1952 in Hobart, Tasmania Kerr has been a member of the Australian House of Representatives since July 1987, representing the electorate of Denison in his island home state. He was Crown Counsel in the Tasmanian Solicitor-General's Department and Dean of the Faculty of Law at the University of Papua New Guinea before entering politics and is the author of Annotated Constitution of Papua New Guinea (1985), Essays on the Constitution (1985), Reinventing Socialism (1992) and Elect the Ambassador; Building Democracy in a Globalised World (2001).

Kerr was leading Counsel in the High Court case Plaintiff S157 v The Commonwealth which was described as one of the seven most far-reaching and influential of the High Court's decisions on constitutional matters in the past 100 years (Crispin Hull, Canberra Times, High Court Centenary Issue). He was appointed a Senior Counsel in 2003 and Adjunct Professor of Law, Faculty of Law, Queensland University of Technology in 2007. Kerr was educated at the University of Tasmania, where at one stage he was President of the Tasmania University Union and has degrees in both law and social work.

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Political offices
Preceded by
Michael Tate		 Minister for Justice
1993–1996		 Succeeded by
Daryl Williams
Preceded by
Michael Duffy		 Attorney-General of Australia
1993		 Succeeded by
Michael Lavarch
Parliament of Australia
Preceded by
Michael Hodgman		 Member for Denison
1987 – present		 Incumbent
v • d • e
Current Members of the Australian House of Representatives from Tasmania
Labor
Persondata
NAME Kerr, Duncan James Colquhoun
ALTERNATIVE NAMES
SHORT DESCRIPTION Australian politician
DATE OF BIRTH 26 February 1952
PLACE OF BIRTH Hobart, Tasmania, Australia
DATE OF DEATH living
PLACE OF DEATH