Simon Potter is a partner in our Litigation Group in Montréal. He is highly regarded for his versatility as a corporate and commercial trial and appellate lawyer, and for his experience in all areas of administrative law dealing with trade and competition issues.

Mr. Potter appears regularly before all federal and Québec courts, as well as before numerous regulatory boards and other agencies, such as the Canadian International Trade Tribunal and the Competition Bureau.

In his commercial litigation practice, he has handled a variety of cases ranging from class actions to corporate contractual liability to competition issues and constitutional questions, including the challenge of the federal legislation banning the Canadian advertising of tobacco products.

Mr. Potter has participated in bi-national panels created under Chapter 19 of the NAFTA to review determinations of dumping and of subsidizations, as well as on a bi-national panel formed under Chapter 20 of the FTA to hear a dispute between Canada and the United States as to American regulations imposing minimum sizes for lobster imported from Canada.

He also has experience in handling major arbitrations at both the national and international levels, either as counsel to a party or as an arbitrator.

Over the years, Mr. Potter has taken an active part in the direction of various bar associations, including the Canadian Bar Association, of which he was president for the year 2002-2003. Mr. Potter is a Fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers and a member of the American Bar Association, the International Bar Association, the London Court of International Arbitration, and the Permanent Court of Arbitration. He is also a member of the Advisory Board of the Canadian Forum on Civil Justice, the Canada-United States Law Institute's Executive Committee and Advisory Board, and a Fellow of the Litigation Counsel of America.

He is a member of the Canadian Bar Association’s Class Action Task Force, the major responsibilities of which are to establish a judicial protocol to ensure better co-ordination between the courts in different provinces, avoid duplication as well as inefficiencies in the trying of a case, and develop national class rules that could withstand constitutional challenge.

Mr. Potter has frequently appeared as a leading lawyer in the Chambers Global: The World’s Leading Lawyers for Business and in the Canadian Legal Lexpert Directory, a guide to the leading law firms and practitioners in Canada, as a leading lawyer in the areas of class actions, commercial arbitration, international trade regulation, corporate commercial litigation, directors’ and officers’ liability and public law litigation. He is also listed in the most recent edition of Chambers Canada as a leading lawyer in the area of commercial litigation.

Mr. Potter is also listed in the Lexpert American Lawyer Guide to the leading 500 Lawyers in Canada as a leading lawyer in the areas of class action litigation, corporate commercial litigation and international trade, in the recent edition of Who’s Who Legal Canada in product liability defence and trade and customs, and in the current edition of The Legal 500 - Canada in the areas of dispute resolution and international law.

In the 2017 edition of Best Lawyers of Canada, Mr. Potter received "Lawyer of the Year" honours in the practice area of Administrative and Public Law for Montreal. In the same publication, he is also listed in the specialities of bet-the-company litigation, class action litigation, corporate and commercial litigation, international arbitration and international trade and finance law.

In 2014, Mr. Potter was awarded the title Advocatus Emeritus by the Québec Bar in recognition of his contribution to the profession. In 2015, the Quebec Branch of the Canadian Bar Association awarded him the Prix Jules-Deschênes, recognizing his exceptional dedication to the Association. He received his BA from Dartmouth College in 1971, and his BCL from McGill University in 1974 and was called to the Québec bar
in 1975.