News & Publications

Rita Andreone, QC and Chat Ortved prepared a Q&A guide to "Corporate Governance and Directors' Duties in Canada: Overview." The Q&A gives a high level overview of board composition, the comply or explain approach, management rules and authority, directors’ duties and liabilities, transactions with directors and conflicts, company meetings, internal controls, accounts and audit, institutional investors and reform proposals.

Nicole Skuggedal and Katy Allen's article, "Class Action for Workplace Sexual Harassment Allowed to Proceed" was featured in Canadian HR Reporter's newsletter section, Canadian Employment Law Today.

Craig Ferris, QC, FCIArb. was quoted in a recent article in The Lawyer's Daily, "B.C. modernizes class action legislation; group looking into same for Ontario." This article discusses British Columbia's changes to modernize its legislation on class action proceedings and examines how this may lead to an increase in class actions.

Read the full article here.

On Thursday, April 12, 2018, Arbutus Biopharma Corporation (“Arbutus”), an industry-leading hepatitis B virus (HBV) therapeutic solutions company and Roivant Sciences Ltd. (“Roivant”) announced that they have entered into an agreement to launch Genevant Sciences (“Genevant”), a jointly-owned company focused on the discovery, development, and commercialization of a broad range of RNA-based therapeutics.

Craig Ferris, Q.C.,FCIArb has written a new Commercial Litigation and Dispute Resolution Blog post entitled, "Transactional Common Interest Privilege Recognized by the Federal Court of Appeal" discussing the Federal Court of Appeal’s recent decision on common interest privilege in a transactional context.

This paper discusses contract law issues including decisions of relevance to commercial lawyers and business leaders giving a snapshot of particular principles of interest that arose in case law over the past 12 months.

Peter Roberts was quoted in The Lawyer's Daily article "B.C. condo ruling will ‘absolutely’ have impact outside province: lawyer" on Tuesday, January 9. The article discusses a recent British Columbia Supreme Court decision that said a minority of condo owners cannot block the sale of their building will have reverberations across the country.

Paul Negenman and Randy Madsen were featured in a Lexpert article that discussed Torxen Energy and Schlumberger Production Management (SPM)’s purchase of Palliser Block assets from Cenovus Energy Inc. for cash consideration of $1.3 billion. The deal closed on December 7, 2017.

Lawson Lundell LLP is pleased to announce the promotion of the following 6 associates who became partners as of January 1, 2018.

Peter Roberts was quoted in an article from the Globe and Mail "Condo unit owners can’t block building sale, B.C. Supreme Court rules." The article discusses a recent strata-wind up decision made by the B.C. Supreme Court.

Lawson Lundell recently advised Dometic Group AB on Canadian matters in respect of its USD$875 million acquisition of SeaStar Solutions from affiliates of American Securities LLC.

The team included: 

Andrew Robertson (Corporate)

Zander Grant (Corporate)

Megan Kaneen (Pensions and Benefits)

Lisa Chamzuk (Pensions and Benefits)

Rob Sider (Labour & Employment)

Katy Allen (Labour & Employment)

Deborah Cushing (Labour & Employment)

Marko Vesely (Litigation)

Jennifer Nyland (Environmental)

Will Shaw (Environmental)

Len Glass (Tax)

Gareth Williams (Tax)

For more information, please visit:  

https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20171215005736/en/Alvarez-Arrieta-Diaz-Silveira-Successfully-Closes-Dometic-Group

Jim Fraser was quoted in an article in Mansion Global "What Areas of Canada Have the Highest and Lowest Property Tax Rates?"

Rita Andreone, QC was featured in the Greater Vancouver Board of Trade's ("GVBOT") Director Spotlight for their newspaper, Sounding Board which was published as an insert in the December 2017 Edition of Business in Vancouver. 

See the PDF attached above.

In honour of Canada’s 150th birthday - the book “Your Turn – Powerful Thoughts from Today’s Women to the Next” was published and soft-launched November 14th. The official publication launch in hard-copy format will be on November 28th in Toronto. Val Mann was invited to be one of the 150 women in the book. Other contributors include C-Suite executives, entrepreneurs, athletes, artists, academics and MPs from across Canada.

Congratulations to Lawson Lundell partner Jack Yong on being named one of Lexpert’s Rising Stars – Leading Lawyers Under 40 for 2017.

Nicholas Shon and Andrew Mildenhall's article, "Reducing vacate clauses in B.C. residential tenancy agreements" was published in the Lawyer's Daily on Friday, November 17, 2017. 

Amaan Gangji was quoted in an article from Canadian Lawyer Magazine entitled “Essential practice habits — delegation” that was published on November 6th, 2017. The article discusses delegation as an essential habit for lawyers to develop when managing their workload. 

In honour of Canada’s 150th birthday - the book “Your Turn – Powerful Thoughts from Today’s Women to the Next” was published and soft-launched November 14th. Val Mann was invited to be one of the 150 women in the book.

Senior Mining Partners, Karen MacMillan and Khaled Abdel-Barr have written the Canadian chapter of this year's International Comparative Legal Guide: Mining Law. Read the full chapter about their projections of the industry for 2018.

Lawson Lundell LLP is honoured to be once again shortlisted by Chambers & Partners in the category of Regional Law Firm of the Year for the 2017 Chambers Canada Awards. Our firm was named Regional Law Firm of the Year in 2015 and was shortlisted in 2016. 

These awards are based on the research for the 2018 edition of Chambers Canada: Canada’s Leading Lawyers for Business. These awards reflect a law firm’s pre-eminence in key practice areas. They also reflect notable achievements over the past 12 months including outstanding work, impressive strategic growth and excellence in client service. 

Award winners will be honoured at this year’s Chambers Canada Guide Launch and Awards Ceremony being held on September 27th at the Renaissance Toronto Downtown Hotel.

Rita Andreone, QC has written an article entitled, “Pondering Career Development” in the Fall 2017 Edition of Business in Vancouver: Women in Business. The article discusses some pieces of advice to consider throughout your career. 

We are pleased to announce that 46 of Lawson Lundell LLP’s lawyers have been recognized in the 12th Edition of The Best Lawyers in Canada® across 30 practice areas. Each year, The Best Lawyers in Canada compiles lists of outstanding lawyers by conducting peer-review surveys whereby leading lawyers confidentially evaluate their professional peers.

On July 25th, 2017 Jeffrey Read was quoted in a Lexpert article, “OSC criticizes TSX for casual proxy tactic approval”. This article discusses the Ontario Securities Commission recent Eco Oro decision in reprimanding the Toronto Stock Exchange for approving a private placement that uses questionable tactics meant to block a proxy challenge.

Craig Ferris, QC and Lisa Peters, QC co-authored a chapter on "International Arbitration" for the 2017 Chambers Global Practice Guides. The chapter discusses key topics in Canadian arbitration law. 

Vancouver’s new Empty Homes Tax became effective January 1, 2017.

Targeting the approximately 10,000 year-round empty and 10,000 under-occupied homes in Vancouver, homes which are unoccupied for six full months of the year or more, will be subject to the new 1%  Empty Homes Tax (the “EHT”) imposed by Vancouver’s new Vacancy Tax By-law No. 11674 (the “By-law”).  Homes that are determined or deemed to be vacant will be subject to an EHT equal to 1% of the property’s taxable assessed value in addition to the existing property tax.  The EHT will be applied annually, with the first taxation year beginning January 1, 2017.  The tax for 2017 would be payable by April 2018.

Click the above pdf to read more.