Peter Dawkins joined the Department of Education as Secretary on 10 July 2006. In August 2007 the Department acquired responsibility for Early Childhood Development and was renamed the Department of Education and Early Childhood Development.  

Prior to that Professor Dawkins was Deputy Secretary of the Victorian Department of Treasury and Finance (DTF) from April 2005, where he was responsible for overseeing economic and financial policy advice for the Victorian Government. This included leading the DTF’s work on the national reform agenda for the Council of Australian Governments (COAG).  

Before joining the Victorian Public Service professor Dawkins worked at a number of British and Australian universities, becoming a Professor of Economics in 1990 at Curtin University in Western Australia. From 1996–2005 he was the Ronald Henderson Professor and Director of the Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research at the University of Melbourne, where he also served for a period as Dean of the Faculty of Economics and Commerce. He continues to hold the title of Professor of Economics at the University of Melbourne.  

As Secretary he is directly responsible for the management of the Department of Education and Early Childhood Development. He is also responsible for ensuring that the Minister for Education and the Minister for Children and Early Childhood Development are supported by the Department in the management and administration of their portfolios.  

As Secretary he is also responsible for the performance agreements of the CEOs of the VCAA (Victorian Curriculum and Assessment Authority) and the VRQA (Victorian Registration and Qualifications Authority), which have independent boards to whom they report on the conduct of their functions as statutory authorities. The Secretary is an ex-officio member of those boards.  

As well as being a member of AESOC (Australian Education Senior Officials Committee) and NSOC (National Senior Officials Committee for Vocational Education and Training), Professor Dawkins has been asked by the Council for the Australian Federation (comprising the First Ministers of the States and Territories) to chair a Review of the Adelaide Declaration on National Goals for Schooling.  

As an academic Professor Dawkins was the author or editor of several books and numerous journal articles on a range of economic and social issues. He was also a prominent public policy analyst and adviser and served on a number of federal and state government committees. For the Commonwealth, this included the reference group that produced the McClure Report on Welfare Reform; the Prime Minister’s Science Engineering and Innovation Council; and the Australian Statistics Advisory Council. For the State Government this included an expert reference group on Commonwealth–State Relations; and the Victorian Workforce Participation Taskforce.  

Professor Dawkins is a Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences in Australia and a Fellow of the Institute of Public Administration (Victoria).