An accomplished government relations specialist with experience in both the public and private sector has been appointed to the position of special adviser to York President & Vice Chancellor Mamdouh Shoukri.
"I am very pleased to announce that Peter Sadlier-Brown has been appointed to the position of special adviser to the president effective Aug. 7. As special adviser, Peter is responsible for advancing York’s academic and strategic plans through working relationships with all levels of government," said Shoukri.
"Peter brings with him many years of experience in government relations and public policy. His career history includes over 17 years as an assistant deputy minister in various ministries in the Ontario Government and a number of years as a consultant on government relations and public policy issues. I am confident that he will bring great strength to this important work at the University and serve the institution with great distinction. Please join me in welcoming 
Peter to the York community"
Right: Peter Sadlier-Brown
Since 1969 Sadlier-Brown has been working with politicians, business and labour leaders, governments and universities on public policy issues. He left graduate studies to take a position on Parliament Hill in the newly established NDP Research Office, where he was one of the staffers who developed David Lewis’s Corporate Welfare Bums campaign in 1972.
He moved on to become the research director for the International Association of Machinists & Aerospace workers. From there he moved to the C.D. Howe Research Institute, then based in Montreal, where he co-authored the Annual Review and wrote about demographic and labour market issues.
Sadlier-Brown joined the Ontario Public Service in 1979. He started as a manager in the Office of Economic Policy, Ministry of Treasury & Economics. He led the design of the Ontario government’s wage control program under the 1982 Inflation Restraint Act and developed the subsequent exit strategy. He became the director of the Office of Economic Policy in 1983 and was appointed assistant deputy minister, Office of the Budget in 1985.
He was the senior civil servant responsible for the first two budgets of the Peterson government. He then became ADM Labour Policy and Programs in the Ontario Ministry of Labour where he helped develop reforms for the Workers Compensation Act and the Occupational Health & Safety Act.
Sadlier-Brown then joined the Ministry of Intergovernmental Affairs as the assistant deputy minister of federal provincial relations and participated in the failed effort to get a pan-Canadian agreement on the Meech Lake Accord.
In 1990 he moved to the Ministry of Industry & Trade as assistant deputy minister with policy responsibilities that included industrial policy, economic development policy trade policy and science and technology policy. Sadlier-Brown was directly involved in the winding down of many government direct assistance to business programs, the creation of the Ontario Research & Development Challenge Fund, the Ontario Strategic Skills Initiative, restructuring of the Centres of Excellence program and provincial participation in North American Free Trade Agreement negotiations. He was involved in the negotiation of the Agreement on Internal Trade and was co-chair of the industry committee in the national consultative process on Global Climate Change. He briefly returned to the Ministry of Finance as assistant deputy minister with environmental policy responsibilities before retiring from the Ontario Public Service.
As a private consultant, Sadlier-Brown has provided his expertise to the federal government, the government of the Province of Ontario and Toyota Motors Manufacturing Corporation before joining McMaster University as government relations adviser to the president. At McMaster, he helped develop a government relations strategy for all three levels of government and participated in a number of successful initiatives and some that have not succeeded yet. The successes include getting government support for the McMaster Innovation Park, the Medical Radiation Sciences program, the funding of new places for the McMaster medical school and in persuading the two federal governments to relocate the CANMET Materials Technology Lab from Ottawa to the McMaster Innovation Park site.
Sadlier-Brown is the vice-chair of the Health Professions Regulatory Advisory Council, a body that advises the Minister Health & Long Term Care on a range of issues related to the regulation or non regulation of various health professions.
He is married to Karen Sadlier-Brown, assistant deputy minister of corporate & electricity finance at the Ontario Financing Authority, an agency of the Ontario Ministry of Finance. They have one son, Joshua, a musician and audio engineer in New York City.