The winners were announced at a gala at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre on Tuesday
At the Metro Toronto Convention Centre on Tuesday night, Nicole Vaz, Trillium Health Partners’ senior vice president, general counsel, and chief compliance and privacy officer, reflected on the hospital redevelopment project that, just moments earlier, had been recognized as the Infrastructure & Projects Deal of the Year at the 2026 Canadian Law Awards.
The Trillium deal, which covers the design, construction, financing, and maintenance of two hospitals in Mississauga, Ontario, is notable in two respects: with the project valued at $13.9 billion, the deal is one of the largest infrastructure transactions in Canadian history. It is also widely recognized as the first project in Canada to use a formal progressive design-build-finance-maintain delivery model.
For Vaz, though, the deal is significant for another reason. “I think we have always had in our mind the fact that this build is more than bricks and mortar,” she said. “This build is intended to represent a transformative era of delivery of care to the community through technology, through innovation, and through patient design and care.”
Later that night, Brett Anderson, McCarthy Tétrault's regional managing partner for Alberta, reflected on another award-winning transaction. Strathcona Resources' hostile takeover bid and Cenovus Energy's acquisition of MEG Energy – which spanned six months and expanded Cenovus’ portfolio, making it one of Canada’s largest oil and gas producers – took home the Canadian Law Award for M&A Deal of the Year.
The transaction required navigating a host of novel legal issues. But for Anderson, the deal’s success boils down to an ethos of teamwork.
“I think these types of large deals require a ton of collaboration. And we work as a team,” he said. “We had people from across the country working on this deal, a huge team in Calgary working tirelessly, and just all the different practice areas coming together to really make sure we had the right thing for the client and get the job done.”
Vaz and Anderson were among those celebrated Tuesday night at the annual Canadian Law Awards. Held at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre, the awards gala honoured the legal industry’s most exceptional individuals, achievements, and organizations across 26 categories.
Among those who were recognized for their careers was Michael Rosenberg, a partner at McCarthy Tétrault and vice chair of the firm’s national class actions group. He took home the Litigator of the Year award.
Asked what he attributed his success to, Rosenberg was quick to point to his colleagues. “I’ve got great teams that I work with on big cases. We’ve got each other’s backs, and we’ve got our clients’ interests at heart,” he said.
“We’ve been working relentlessly under difficult conditions to advance particular claims on behalf of First Nations that are seeking basic infrastructure and service commitments from the federal government. We’ve had some big wins over the last year, and I think this award recognizes that,” Rosenberg added.
“At the end of the day, what happens in a courtroom is only consequential if it builds houses, delivers safe drinking water, reforms child welfare – all those big nation-building projects.”
Another lawyer recognized for her career at the gala was Melissa Kennedy, executive vice president and chief legal and public policy officer at Sun Life, who received the Lifetime Achievement in the Legal Profession - In-House award. Asked what advice she would give a lawyer just starting in their career, Kennedy was succinct: “Work hard and don’t be afraid to take risks.”
Lawyers’ jobs, she explained, are to identify risks. “Sometimes we can become risk-averse ourselves,” Kennedy said. “Not just for our work, but ourselves.”
The legal department at CPP Investments took home not one, but two awards: Law Department Innovation and Banking and Financial Services Law Department of the Year. The department secured its win for the former award when it introduced an AI governance and validation model to CPP last year, enabling internal AI workflow performance to be tested, improved, and scaled.
Asked how he reconciled the risks of AI on the one hand, and the need to innovate on the other, department managing director Marc Flynn said one of the decisions CPP made early on as an organization “was to have the risk management and governance team in partnership with the enablement team, and working together.
“The capability that we’ve been recognized for with the award tonight is really in that spirit,” Flynn continued. “This allows the organization to adopt more AI capabilities because we can trust them.”
Others reflected on what it was like to be honoured by their peers. Speaking on behalf of her firm, which took home the Regional Law Firm of the Year - Ontario award, Lerners partner Rebecca Shoom said the recognition was “really appreciated.
“Our firm has grown a lot, and we take a lot of pride in what we do. Serving our clients and coming to the table and treating everybody like their problems matter, and that our outcomes are important to them, is really at the heart of what we do,” Shoom said. “It means a lot to see that recognized by other people in the industry and our peers who are here tonight.”
See the full list of winners here.
With files from Branislav Urosevic.
