Lack of law profession transparency preventing necessary culture change
Tuesday, February 27, 2018 If you’re Law Society of Ontario (LSO) treasurer Paul Schabas, you’ve got to be frustrated by the results of the recent LSO survey that prompted 20 per cent of responding articling students to reveal that they had received “unwelcome attention.” The results evidence the culture of a profession lagging precariously behind […]
Canadian pension funds increasingly using co-investments to diversify real estate holdings
March 6, 2018 In their constant search for diversification, Canada’s largest pension funds seem to be continually restructuring their Canadian office building portfolios. “The goal has been to redeploy their investments by expanding internationally and developing new class A office buildings in Canada as well,” says Ayres Gonsalves, vice-president of commercial at Dorsay Development Corp., a […]
Dealmakers relieved as appeal court says privileged information can be shared
The unanimous ruling from the three-judge panel overturns a lower court judgment that treated the sharing of such information as a ‘waiver’ of legal privilege March 13, 2018 Dealmakers breathed a huge sigh of relief last week when the Federal Court of Appeal (FCA) gave them the go-ahead to share privileged communications with other parties […]
Blockchain is coming your way
Blockchain technology is transforming businesses in a wide range of industries. Are you ready? Jul 6, 2018 When Samuel Osei of Samuel Osei Law Corporation in Vancouver first found himself dealing with blockchain and cryptocurrency issues, he chose to keep his activities under wraps. “When I first started doing the work, I didn’t put cryptocurrency in […]
New boots-on-the-ground trade association to boost ties between Canada, EU
The Canada EU Trade Investment Association is a cross-sector industry group out to promote dealmaking September 12, 2018 Canadian companies need to be much more active in Brussels in order to take full advantage of the Canada-European Union Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement. “CETA, for the first time, includes a standalone chapter on regulatory cooperation […]
UK clarifies scope of privilege
Decision of Court of Appeal allays concerns about narrowing scope of professional privilege Nov 27, 2018 A RECENT DECISION of England and Wales’s Court of Appeal has allayed concerns about the narrowing scope of professional privilege afforded to legal advice in the United Kingdom. The decision in Director of the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) v. Eurasian Natural Resources Corporation (ENRC), released […]
Law firms falling down on physical data security
Wednesday, June 19, 2019 @ 10:55 AM | By Julius Melnitzer Forget cybersecurity — because law firms, it appears, can’t even keep their desks clean. Notwithstanding all the noise coming from C-suite types and in-house counsel about the critical nature of data protection, a recent survey from Oakville, Ont.,-based Shred-it — which is, somewhat ironically, […]
Case a Reminder Law Firms Must Have Comprehensive Conflict Systems
A Federal Court judge, citing Lawson Lundell LLP’s failure to take adequate or timely measures to prevent information confidential to a dispute from being shared internally in the face of a conflict of interest, has disqualified the firm from acting on judicial review applications against the party to whom the information belonged. The twist in […]