Robert (Bob) Giltinan OAM is a former professional tennis player who reached a career-high ranking of world number 16. Bob was a member of two winning Australian Davis Cup squads (1973 & 1977) and reached the singles semi-final of the Australian Open in 1977.
Bob subsequently managed elite and junior tennis players, and held numerous roles including NSW State Coach and National Selector. He founded 'Giltinan's Tennis & Squash Centre' in the Northern Beaches (North Manly), which he managed for more than 20 years.
In 2008, Bob stood as an independent candidate for Warringah Council and was elected. He was re-elected at the 2012 local government elections, after which he was elected Deputy Mayor.
With the amalgamation of Warringah Council into Northern Beaches Council in 2016, Bob ceased being a councillor, but was appointed by the Administrator to serve on in an advisory role.
In 2019, Bob was awarded the Medal of the Order of Australia for service to tennis and the community of the Northern Beaches.
In 2000, Bob was awarded the Australian Sports Medal for service as a previous player and manager of elite players, and the Australian Defence Medal for National Service with the Australian Army.
Contact
Robert.Giltinan@northernbeaches.nsw.gov.au
Inauguration speech 2024
Thank you, Scott.
Well, as you can see, I'm the youngest one on the team. I don't know what Vince was talking about, but when he said that "He's older than me." I wonder if, I was wondering who he was referring to.
Yeah, being a Councillor back again is, it's great news for me. I really enjoyed my eight years with Warringah. And in my first life, I was a tennis player and travelled the world, and I guess there's very few countries that I haven't been to, but there's no better spot than here, right on the Northern Beaches, and people, you know, they say, "Oh, we're going to go over there, "we're going to here, we're going to there." And I said, "Why would you bother?" 'Cause there's so many countries that, as I say, there's beautiful countries around, but we are in as good a spot as there is.
Well, to be a Councillor initially was the furthest thing from my mind. I took over a tennis centre in North Manly, and I ran that for 18 years with my wife and my two kids. And I had a lot of people talking to me during that time saying, "Oh, the sports field at so and so "is not much good." And "This is not much good. "This tennis centre here has run down." And then after a while, quite a few of them said to me, "Why don't you, why don't you go onto it "try and get onto the council, "and maybe you can make a difference 'with these sports fields?" And I thought, "Well, that's pretty good "because these days, you know what I see a lot of the kids, "they come home from school, "and they sit in front of the TV, and they got their little gadgets, and you know, you don't see 'em again until dinner time. So I think it's very important, and that will be my main aim as a Councillor again, that I want to make sure that all the fields are up and running well, that our kids can get out and enjoy these various sports, whatever sport they play.
I actually, I've had a lot of calls from different people when I got elected, and my best friend, John Alexander, rang me and said, "Gilto, you're back on council." I said, "Yeah, mate, it's good, eh." He said, "Well, it's the end "of the Northern Beaches as we knew it." And I was actually responsible for JA being a, being an MP because see, when I first ran for Warringah and got elected, he was there at the party, and he said to me, "Gilto, I think I might run as an MP, "'cause if you got elected, I'm a shoo in." And as it turns out, he was right.
Not much more for me to say, at just, at the present time, I'm Vice President of the Manly Warringah War Memorial Trust. So that takes a fair bit of time. But I think it's very important we have the kids come down there from school, and they learn all about the wars and the things, and how they're here today, where a lot of the, a lot of the young men and women of Australia that went on what they thought was going to be a holiday, never, as they were getting off the boats, that was the end of their holiday, and the end of their life. And the sooner we can sort the world out, it'll be a better place for everybody. War never helps anybody. And as you say, it's just the most dreadful things that are happening around the world today. And we are very, very lucky that we are so far away from it. But we've got to, they've got to find an end to this. It's just when you see on TV, all these children being murdered, and it's just a disgrace.
I'm very, I'm very happy to be back as a Councillor. And I will do my very best to represent the people in the best of my ability. And as I say, I'm very looking forward to the challenge.
Thank you.