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LEGAL REPORT/ADR Vis International Commercial Arbitration Moot held in Vienna. The victory marked the second time a Canadian university has won the Vis award, the first being Osgoode Hall Law School in 2004. There is, however, concern in the arbi- tration community that Canada could lose its unofficial favoured-nation sta- tus for a number of reasons. In a sense, the country has rested on its laurels in the arbitration sphere, failing to enact new legislation dealing with this grow- ing field and neglecting to create special courts to hear arbitration cases, which has resulted in unexpected decisions that garner prominent play internationally. As well, international centres are spending more time and effort to tout themselves as arbitration destinations. Besides the tradi- tional arbitration heavyweight locales of New York, Paris, and London, places such as Hong Kong, Dubai, and Stockholm are touting their international arbitration credentials complete with glitzy market- ing materials. "It is a good news, bad news story I guess," says Barry Leon, a partner at Perley-Robertson Hill & McDougall LLP in Ottawa. "We are leaders in some ways and there is a lot of opportunity that lies ahead but we have got to get our act together." Leon, who is also the incoming chair- man of the arbitration committee of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce (recent- ly renamed the International Chamber of Commerce), says beyond the disadvan- tages of not having specialized courts and aggressively pursuing arbitration work, federal and provincial governments have been slow to act. Ottawa now has a push on to sign more bilateral investment trea- ties dealing with arbitration — designed to attract foreign companies. Canada was also slow to sign on to the World Bank's International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes, which is designed to keep commercial disputes out of the courts. A number of provinces, including Quebec and Alberta, have yet to pass legis- lation to adopt the convention. "It has put our companies behind, it makes Canada less attractive as a place for foreign invest- ment to some degree and it makes it more difficult for Canadian companies that are investing abroad," says Leon. The recognition that more has to be done to ensure that Canada maintains its "market share" with regard to interna- tional arbitration has spurred the coun- try's arbitration community to push for changes. The International Chamber of Commerce and the Canadian Bar Association are calling for the ICSID convention to be adopted across the country. The chamber of commerce's national committee, the Toronto Commercial Arbitration Society, and the Western Canada Arbitrators RoundTable have also banded together and are urging the federal government to adopt changes to the UNCITRAL Model Law on Arbitration that were introduced in 2006 and are now the focus of adoption and implementation by a number of other countries. 40 SEPTEMBER 2011 www. CANADIAN Lawyermag.com Carswell-25352_CL_Sep_11.indd 1 11-09-30 8:26 AM