Legal news and trends for Canadian in-house counsel and c-suite executives
Issue link: https://digital.canadianlawyermag.com/i/50891
business Back in of your business, and so the in-house lawyers must know the business very well, then work with the outside coun- sel to help get you to where you need to be," says MacDonald. Not only were the lawyers faced with a back-breaking workload, but they also had to carry the burden of pressure from politi- cians, the public, GM employees, and other interested parties. As MacDonald notes, they were dark days. "There was a lot of sacrifice, a lot of hard work, and I think the faith and support that we had from our stake- holders, including the governments, is paying these dividends," he says. "While there's some noise in the system still as we continue through the restructuring, I don't think there's any question that this was a very successful restructuring that preserved a great deal of wealth and opportunity to very many people." Pierre Legault, assistant deputy min- ister of business and regulatory law at the Department of Justice, was in charge of managing the file for the government of Canada. That included co-ordination of legal efforts for vari- ous federal government departments, such as Export Development Canada and Industry Canada, and the Ontario government, in order to present a con- cise Canadian presence in negotiations with the U.S. government. Legault says the file was particularly tough to manage due to the shortened timelines involved. A one-month dead- line was set for a Chrysler deal, while GM had two months to get its house in order. Legault recalls working 55 hours straight as the Chrysler deadline approached. With both companies, U.S. President Barack Obama set a firm noon press conference to announce the outcome on deadline day. That meant an extension was out of the question. "That was our ultimate timeline or objective," says Legault. "There was no question that we could not go back and ask for more time. So that was the ultimate deadline, and we had to adjust to that." Mark Warner, legal director of Ontario's Ministry of Economic Development and Trade, helped co- ordinate the province's restructuring efforts. Lawyers from Goodmans LLP, which acted as outside counsel for the Ontario government, assisted. The file flowed between Warner's ministry and the ministries of Finance and Revenue, but he acted as the overall lead. "My role was really to focus the legal analysis that we were getting from Goodmans, and co-ordinate that with the other ministries involved," says Warner. Outside lawyers were also pulled in at times to consult the province on labour issues. But the bulk of Warner's time was spent liaising with Legault's team to form the transactional document for- malizing the loan agreement between the province and car companies. Warner describes the mood sur- rounding the transactions as "very intense," and says all lawyers involved knew they were dealing with a historic transaction. It was clear early on that 36 • AUGUST 2010 Untitled-4 1 INHOUSE 6/24/10 10:32:13 AM