David Hillyard

David Hillyard was the acting commissioner for Consumer Protection in December 2015 prior to becoming commissioner in 2017 until his retirement in January 2020. Prior to that, he was the director of Consumer Protection’s retail and services directorate. Mr Hillyard has worked with Consumer Protection for over 43 years and has held senior management roles where he was responsible for the regulation of the retail, service industries, motor vehicle sales and repair industries as well as the incorporated association and charity sectors. He first joined the public sector in 1972 as a junior clerk in Crown Law and was promoted to the Department of Labour and Industry in July 1977 before joining Fair Trading. Mr Hillyard worked his way up from his role as a complaints officer to an investigations officer and by 1987, he was a senior investigations officer with Consumer Affairs. He became manager of residential tenancies in January 1990, manager of services industries in July 1995, manager of building and tenancies in July 1999, and director of industry and consumer services in September 2004. Mr Hillyard was awarded the Public Service Medal for outstanding public service in the areas of consumer protection and fair trading in the 2011 Queen’s Birthday Honour List.