Moore-Wilton was appointed Secretary of the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet with effect from 13 May 1996, shortly after John Howard became Prime Minister. He immediately implemented cuts of more than 11,000 staff, including six department heads and proceeded to aggressively outsource various government services. He also oversaw the passing of the, which gave the Prime Minister the power to hire and fire heads of departments. As a result, he was accused of turning the public service into an "ideological office family". Paul Barratt, a former Secretary to the Department of Defence, was one such head of department who fell out of favour with his Minister, John Moore. After the Minister sought to dismiss him, Barratt commenced legal action, claiming unfair dismissal and that Moore-Wilton had failed to follow due process. Barratt had a temporary stay, prior to his dismissal, and subsequently losing, on appeal. Moore-Wilton's approach as departmental secretary may be encapsulated in an address he gave in 1999 to the Institute of Public Administration Australia: In announcing Moore-Wilton's resignation from the Australian Public Service, with effect from 20 December 2002, Prime Minister Howard reflected on Moore-Wilton's contributions:
Business career
In December 2002 Moore-Wilton became the Chief Executive Officer of Sydney Airport Corporation, which was majority owned by Macquarie Bank, after the Federal government gave it a 99-year contract to lease and operate the airport. During his time there he implemented his familiar cost increases to users and staff cutbacks. In addition, the company announced plans to add a high-rise office block, a multi-level car park and retail space. These plans were controversial, considering the fact that local councils, who usually have jurisdiction over such matters, had none as this was federal government land. In April 2006, Moore-Wilton resigned as CEO to become Chairman of Sydney Airport Holdings. Moore-Wilton is a Board Member of the Committee for Sydney and of Infrastructure NSW. He is also Chairman of Southern Cross Austereo, the owners of radio station 2Day FM. In 2013 Moore-Wilton caused controversy at an annual general meeting of the company by answering a question from a shareholder that sought to understand whether the company had a cultural problem, when referring to the death of the UK nurse Jacintha Saldanha, who committed suicide after being the subject of a prank telephone call by breakfast radio hosts employed by 2Day FM. Moore-Wilton stated: "These incidents were unfortunate, no doubt about that. In each particular case we thoroughly investigated them and it comes generally within the context of some of these incidents where a whole series of events come together and in the immortal words of someone whose identity I cannot recall "S-H-I-T happens";" Moore-Wilton's comments drew widespread criticism, with a British politician calling them "an insult to the memory of a loving mother and wife."
