Bob Potts has been a Partner in the firm for more than forty-five years and currently serves as General Counsel for the firm. He is an experienced litigation counsel with a varied practice and extensive client list.
Bob chairs the firm’s Indigenous Law Group, and has actively represented and counselled First Nations since the early 1980’s. He has been consulted by several First Nations and has successfully negotiated a number of land claim settlements in Ontario and Alberta, including:
- Sturgeon Lake First Nation, the Tallcree Tribal Government, and Alexander First Nation in relation to their Treaty Land Entitlement (“TLE”) Claims and a number of Specific Claims in Alberta. Each of these claims was successfully concluded, and received overwhelming support in subsequent community ratification votes. The Sturgeon Lake claim was initiated by litigation but evolved into a formal negotiation as a result of our actions;
- Consulted by Moose Factory First Nation and the Witchekan First Nation of Saskatchewan with respect to land claim matters;
- Wikwemikong and Wasauksing First Nations in Ontario;
- Wahta Mohawks of Ontario in connection with a major land claim which was successfully negotiated and has been finalized;
- Bigstone Cree Nation with respect to their TLE and Specific Claim, which culminated in the largest settlement of its kind ever negotiated in Alberta at the time and is one of the most complicated and richest First Nation Land Claim settlements in Canadian history.
- Algonquins of Ontario with respect to Treaty Negotiations that are underway with Canada and Ontario involving the Ottawa Valley and the Nation’s capital.
Bob has been voted by his peers for inclusion in The Best Lawyers in Canada® ranking in the Aboriginal Law category for over 10 years in succession. He is rated by Lexpert® Canadian Legal Directory as a Leading Practitioner (repeatedly recommended) in Indigenous Law.
In 2024, Bob was awarded an Honorary Doctor of Laws Degree which was awarded to him by Osgoode Hall Law School and York University in recognition of the impact that Bob has made as a long-standing legal advocate and expert in Indigenous law.
Bob has successfully completed the Harvard University Mediation Workshop and Advanced Mediation Workshop presented by The Advocates’ Society, and is active in the field of alternative dispute resolution.
He participates in conferences and delivers papers on Aboriginal Law issues. Bob spoke at the 2012 Commonwealth Lawyers Association Property Law Conference in Belfast, Ireland on the subject of "Indigenous Peoples and Land Issues". In September 2007, he was a speaker at the Annual Commonwealth Law Conference held in Kenya, on “Aboriginal Claims in Canada”.
He has chaired seminars and lectured at the Ontario Bar Association, The Law Society of Ontario – Continuing Legal Education, and the Canadian Institute on commercial and litigation practice issues including class action proceedings. Bob has served on the Faculty of the Osgoode Hall Law School Certificate in Fundamentals of Aboriginal Law program.
In addition to his work in Indigenous Law, Bob has successfully acted for clients in disputes involving real estate and business contracts, corporate disputes, and mortgage enforcement remedies. He has defended class actions and served as counsel in several leading cases, including Abdool, Bre-X and the class action stemming from the 2008 propane explosion in Toronto.
Acting on behalf of LawPro (formerly the Lawyers Professional Indemnity Company), Bob has defended solicitors in professional negligence suits. He has represented accountants, agents and brokers, and has represented the professional indemnity company on behalf of the Royal College of Dental Surgeons of Ontario. He has also provided coverage opinions to insurers on a variety of policies.
Bob is a past director of The Advocates’ Society and has been published in The Advocates’ Quarterly, the National Real Property Law Review, and the Canadian Independent Adjuster.