Patrick Douglas (Pat) Purcell (born 17 March 1947) is an Australian politician. He was a Labor member of the Queensland Legislative Assembly from 1992 to 2009.
Purcell was born in the New South Wales town of Cowra. Prior to election to parliament he was the secretary of the Australian Building Construction Employees' and Builders Labourers' Federation (Queensland Branch).
Purcell entered parliament at the 1992 state election as the member for Bulimba. He held the seat until his retirement in 2009.
Purcell served as the Minister for Emergency Services from July 2005 to July 2007 in the Beattie Ministry. Before that he was the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Public Works, Housing and Racing.[1] On 4 July 2007, Purcell announced he would resign from the ministry but continue as the Member for Bulimba.[2] This was initially cited as being for "family reasons", but it soon emerged that he had struck two public servants and had been charged with assault. He insisted he had merely administered a "verbal bollocking", but the assault charges were later dropped when he admitted the offence following mediation. In February 2008, he commented to The Courier-Mail newspaper that his actions were "unprovoked and inappropriate". He did not run for preselection for 2009.[3]