Birrell is currently the a non-executive director of
Transurban and serves on the Management Board of the International Organisation of Employers. He is the President of the
Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry. Recently he retired as the independent chairman of Australia Post Super Scheme (APSS), a fund with 30,000 members. Birrell was made a Fellow of the
Australian Institute of Company Directors in 2007 and a Companion of
Engineers Australia in 2014. Birrell was chairman of the
Port of Melbourne Corporation until November 2016. The Andrews Government embarked on a “privatisation drive” in its first term, with Birrell overseeing the sale of the Port of Melbourne for $9.7 billion. Birrell reflects on this as “….an example of a Labor government wanting to recycle capital from one large asset into other assets. And it was a very good example of public policy working, regardless of the political party in power.” The proceeds of the sale were injected back into Victorian infrastructure projects, including the
Level Crossing Removal Project. Birrell was the founding chairman of
Infrastructure Partnerships Australia, the nation's peak infrastructure body. This not-for-profit organisation undertakes research and policy advocacy on social and economic infrastructure. Other board roles included being an independent non-executive chairman of the
Australian Payments Council, the strategic coordination body for the Australian payments industry, also serving on the board of
Australia Post,{{Cite web|title=Board of directors From 2002-2012 Birrell was the National Leader of the Infrastructure Group and special counsel at
Minter Ellison. == Not-for-profit sector ==