16 LEXPERT
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2016
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WWW.LEXPERT.CA
Duchesne, Marc Borden Ladner Gervais LLP
(514) 954-3102 mduchesne@blg.com
Mr. Duchesne is the co-leader of BLG's Insolvency & Financial Restructuring
Group. He acts as lead counsel on corporate commercial litigation cases
relating to insolvency, restructuring, cross-border and foreign matters,
banking, contracts, insurance and complex liquidations.
Du Pont, AdE, Guy Davies Ward Phillips & Vineberg LLP
(514) 841-6406 gdupont@dwpv.com
Mr. Du Pont focuses on tax, corporate, white collar, class actions, constitu-
tional and administrative matters at all Canadian court levels with a special
expertise in appellate matters. Fellow ACTL. Member, ALI. Ad.E; TCC Medal.
Drymer, Stephen L. Woods LLP
(514) 370-8745 sdrymer@woods.qc.ca
Partner and head of International Arbitration and ADR. Acts as counsel,
arbitrator and mediator in domestic and international commercial and invest-
ment disputes. Recognized as one of Canada's leading international dispute
resolution lawyers.
Douglas, James D.G. Borden Ladner Gervais LLP
(416) 367-6029 jdouglas@blg.com
Mr. Douglas has extensive experience in securities litigation, including share-
holder disputes, M&A litigation, broker liability suits, regulatory proceedings
and prosecutions, criminal prosecutions and class actions. He appears
regularly as counsel before all levels of courts, the Ontario Securities
Commission and other securities regulatory bodies.
Doris, James W.E. Davies Ward Phillips & Vineberg LLP
(416) 367-6919 jdoris@dwpv.com
Mr. Doris specializes in general civil litigation with an emphasis on share-
holder and oppression remedy actions, class actions, contested mergers and
acquisitions, and securities disputes, insolvency, gaming and competition
matters. He has acted for a number of Canada's largest corporations, includ-
ing General Motors of Canada, Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation
and Agnico Eagle Mines Limited.
Dimock, Ronald E. DLA Piper (Canada) LLP
(416) 862-3373 ron.dimock@dlapiper.com
Mr. Dimock's IP practice embraces patents, trademarks and copyright litiga-
tion. He is an engineer, certified specialist in civil litigation and IP law, and
a fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers and the Chartered Institute
of Arbitrators.
LEXPERT-RANKED LAWYERS
'We're going to work with the provinces, but this
patchwork that exists currently, whereby some
provincial laws apply and some federal laws apply
— we're not having that. We're going to change it
to an exclusively federal system.'"
Will the provinces hand off their right to reg-
ulate how the banks treat retail clients in their
home jurisdiction without a fight? While Ottawa
might have paramountcy on its side — which says
in any federal-provincial conflict of law, federal
law trumps — Jamal believes the federal govern-
ment won't take over consumer protection, even
in banking, without a substantial Constitutional
battle. "If the government's saying it's going in to
occupy a space currently occupied by the provinc-
es, I expect there will be litigation."
In the meantime, he says, the issue is being
watched closely by both the plaintiffs' and defen-
dants' Bar. "e plaintiffs because they may see it
as creating new opportunities for litigation, and
the defence Bar because it may give them addi-
tional grounds for defence in some of these con-
sumer-protection class actions."
e Bank Act, comprehensive as it is, can run up
against equally powerful federal statutes such
as the Competition Act that affect financial in-
stitutions. In a reported case, Paul Morrison, a
senior partner in the litigation group at McCar-
thy Tétrault LLP, defended Bank of Nova Scotia
before the Competition Tribunal, the specialty
court for competition challenges, in an abuse-of-
dominance case. An entrepreneur wanted to start
something like a small PayPal but with a twist: he
designed a system for people "who wanted to hide
the payment."
He needed a banking facility in order to run
his business, though. Normally, if someone ap-
plies for a payment facility and the bank has those
facilities, it is obliged by regulation to provide
them. e man claimed that the bank was abus-
ing its market position by denying him. e bank
agued that he had designed a system to provide
secret payment, "especially in the online gambling
world," which risked putting it offside its anti-
money laundering obligations.
So the obligation to provide payment facilities
ran smack into its "really serious obligations" in
the money-laundering area, says Morrison, who
has acted for all the big banks. "at's really where
the tension was in the case."
But there can be tension in any case brought
against a bank, he says, because defence litigators
sometimes have to fight with one hand tied be-
hind their back. Take the "open-market defence"
under which a regular business can argue it's just
doing what is permitted to compete in a free mar-
ket if it decides to raise or lower prices or flood the
market with a certain product.
