Former privacy commissioner dies

Radwanski’s son Adam says his father died suddenly of a heart attack on Thursday.

Radwanski began his career as a reporter in Montreal, winning back-to-back National Newspaper Awards for his editorials in the 1970s and eventually becoming editor-in-chief of the Toronto Star.

He made the transition to public service and politics in the mid-1980s, serving on a major Ontario education review and taking on the post of federal privacy commissioner in 1996.

Radwanski resigned the post in 2003 after an auditor general’s report said that his hefty spending on hospitality amounted to an abuse of public funds.

A judge eventually acquitted Radwanski in 2009 of fraud and breach of trust, but the matter was the beginning of a widespread change to the government’s attitude towards expenses.