Veteran Australian journalist Mike Willesee has died following a battle with throat cancer.
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Willesee started his 50-year television career with the ABC before high-profile periods with the Nine and Seven networks.
The 76-year-old was known for his uncompromising interview style and willingness to push the envelope.
His famous interview with former Opposition Leader John Hewson on the GST was widely credited with changing the course of the 1993 federal election.
Born on June 29, 1942 in Perth, Western Australia, Willesee was the son of ALP Senator Donald Willesee.
He was first introduced to Australian audiences in 1967 on the ABC current affairs program This Day Tonight.
The journalist's fearless interviewing style earned the wrath of many of his subjects but also made him an influential figure.
In April 1967 the Holt government decided not to reappoint ABC Chairman Dr James Darling - a move attributed to Willesee's critical coverage of Holt's policies on the ABC.
Willesee went on to host the ABC's flagship current affairs program Four Corners from 1969 to 1971.
That year commercial television beckoned so Willesee shifted to the Nine Network as host of A Current Affair, where he has been credited with discovering the talent of Sydney Harbour Bridge rigger Paul Hogan.
In 2002 he was inducted into the TV Week Logie Awards Hall of Fame.
In a varied career which has also included horse breeding and racing, Willesee also was a one-time host of Australia's This is Your Life.
His time as host of Channel Nine's A Current Affair, which for some time was named Willesee, often made news as well as reported it.
In 1993 his broadcast of a phone call made to a house under police siege prompted an industry-wide examination of news reporting.
In March 1993, three men had killed five people in Queensland and NSW, before kidnapping four children and holing up with two of them in a farmhouse in Cangai, near Grafton.
As police surrounded the property, a Current Affair researcher was able to place a call to the house.
During an interview which was broadcast on A Current Affair, Willesee asked two of the children being held hostage if they had seen anybody killed.
During a profile on Australian Story in 1998, Willesee said a plane crash in Kenya that year prompted a returned to the Roman Catholicism of his youth.
"That made me stop and think about God," he told the program.
"I thought on balance there probably was a God otherwise this world doesn't make much sense."
Australian Associated Press