Edward Waitzer is a partner and Head of the Corporate Governance Group. His practice focuses on complex business transactions and advising clients in respect of various public policy and governance matters. Ed was Chair of the firm from 1999 to 2006.
Professional Activities
Ed serves as a director of numerous corporations and community organizations, and writes and speaks extensively on a wide range of legal and public policy issues. He is also a contributing editor on the advisory boards of various publications. Ed was Chair of the Strategy Working Party, which restructured the International Accounting Standards Board. He also served as a member of the Canadian Institute of Chartered Accountants’ Task Force on Standard Setting, as a public director of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants, as a member of the Independent Review Panel on the Comptrollership Function in Canada as Chair of the Liquor Control Board of Ontario, as Vice-Chair of Sociedad Quimica y Minera de Chile S.A. (SQM) and past President of the Canada-Chile Business Council.
Ed has been the Falconbridge Professor of Law at Osgoode Hall Law School. He is a professor and holds the Jarislowsky Dimma Mooney Chair in Corporate Governance, and is a Director of the Hennick Centre for Business and Law at Osgoode Hall Law School and Schulich School of Business at York University. He is an inaugural Fellow of the American College of Governance Counsel, and a Senior Fellow at the C.D. Howe Institute and at the Centre for International Governance Innovation.
Ed was recognized as the 2018 recipient of the Corporate Knights Award of Distinction for his prominent role in fostering the legal foundations for responsible corporate behaviour.
Background
Ed was Vice-President of the Toronto Stock Exchange before joining the firm. He practised with Stikeman Elliott from 1981 to 1993, including several years as head of the New York office. Ed rejoined the firm after serving as Chair of the Ontario Securities Commission from 1993 to 1996. He chaired the Technical Committee of the International Organisation of Securities Commissions from 1994 to 1996 after serving as Vice-Chair of its Executive Committee in 1993. During 2003 to 2004, he lived in Santiago and was special advisor to the Chilean Superintendent of Insurance and Securities.