Legal news and trends for Canadian in-house counsel and c-suite executives
Issue link: https://digital.canadianlawyermag.com/i/1336129
www.canadianlawyermag.com/inhouse 15 staying connected to colleagues as significant challenges in 2020. External spend in 2020 increased from the previous year for 63 per cent of respondents, with isolated situations and issues around the pandemic identified as common reasons for the increase. One survey respondent commented that there were "not enough internal resources" while another wrote that "the work sent out was overflow/volume and urgency due to COVID-19." While the pandemic did lead to some increased expenses at VIA Rail, the moderniza- tion initiative and legal issues around the blockades were primarily responsible for a surge in external spend, says Richard. Ramjass pinpoints isolated incidents in addition to some pandemic-related matters as the main causes of increased spend at McDonald's. "We definitely saw our external legal spend increase this year, primarily because of unique situations that were not pandemic related," says Ramjass. "We had some litigation that we did not see coming so we had to deal with that. We also did get some external advice on the pandemic, especially in regard to real estate as we are a major tenant across Canada." External legal spend was in line with that of the prior year at Wolseley Canada, the Canadian subsidiary of Ferguson plc, a specialist distributor of plumbing and heating products. "When I look at the reasons for the spend being what it was, it was probably due to a couple of isolated situations and not much surrounding the pandemic in particular," says Greg Kerr, vice president of legal, risk and compliance and general counsel at Wolseley. When asked about the reasons for outsourcing work, the top reason noted by survey respondents was for expertise that is lacking in-house, and litigation tops the list of matters to be outsourced, with 73 per cent of respondents saying they outsource litigation matters. "It's not necessarily that there is expertise lacking," says Ramjass. "Two out of our six lawyers come from a litigation background, but we don't do litigation work because we have more than enough work to do in-house. We outsource because we just don't have time to run every file." Litigation is also regularly outsourced at Wolseley, together with environmental issues, and acquisitions. As a Crown corporation, strategic positioning is an "A firm is made up of individual lawyers, and if those lawyers switch, we are likely going to switch with them." Will Ramjass, McDonald's Canada DOES THE GENERAL COUNSEL HAVE THE AUTONOMY TO SELECT FIRMS? 61.19% Yes, the general counsel/ legal department makes the decision 25.37% It is a shared decision with executive management/board 5.97% No, the general counsel isn't involved in the selection process 7.46% It is a shared decision with the procurement department/process WHAT ARE THE LEGAL AREAS YOU SEND TO OUTSIDE FIRMS THE MOST? Litigation Employment/labour Intellectual property Real estate Mergers & acquisitions Privacy legislation and data protection Class action Tax Regulatory matters General corporate work (contracts, etc.) Immigration Securities/corporate finance Environmental Information technology (contracts, licensing, etc.) U.S./cross-border Advertising/marketing Other Risk mitigation 72.73% 56.36% 36.36% 36.36% 36.36% 25.45% 23.64% 23.64% 23.64% 21.82% 16.36% 16.36% 14.55% 12.73% 9.09% 9.09% 9.09% 0%