Catherine Pawluch is Senior Counsel in the firm's Toronto office. She is co-head of Canada's Transportation group and a member of the Anti-trust and Competition group. Catherine represents clients in relation to supply chain and distribution law matters, including compliance with trade, import, and export controls, including international transport and third-party logistics companies and Fortune 500 manufacturers, producers, and retailers.
Catherine's regulatory law practice also focuses on competition law and foreign investment law, including the national security provisions of Canada's Investment Canada Act. She has extensive experience in pre-merger approvals and has counselled US, Japanese, Asian and other foreign corporations across a range of industries, including the mining, energy and LNG industries, and the aviation, transportation, manufacturing, retailing and consumer products sectors.
Catherine has obtained Competition Act and Investment Canada Act clearances for numerous merger transactions. She also has experience advising foreign companies that are the subject of multinational conspiracy and bid-rigging investigations in seeking immunity and in their dealings with the Criminal Branch of the Competition Bureau and the Public prosecution Service of Canada.
Catherine is a much sought after speaker. She was invited to speak at the Third Chinese Enterprises Outbound Investment Conference in Beijing, sponsored by the CCPIT and the Canada China Business Council. More than 800 Chinese enterprises with a "Go Global" mandate attended the Conference. Catherine made a presentation on Canada's new foreign investment law at the "Invest in Canada" seminar. She also travelled to Beijing and presented a briefing on Canada's new SOE guidelines to various Chinese State-owned enterprises targeting investments in Canada. Additionally, Catherine was invited to speak at the 2025 Annual Conference of the International Bar Association. She joined an international panel of aviation lawyers from the United Kingdom, Italy, Mexico and Canada, which addressed current issues in aircraft financing. Catherine spoke on current Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) considerations in aircraft leasing/financing.
Following the implementation of NAFTA, Catherine was invited as an expert in the field to participate on a tri-national committee to harmonize liability laws and to create a uniform bill of lading for surface transportation in the three NAFTA countries.
Catherine has written extensively on foreign ownership restriction in various industry sectors. She is an active member of the Canadian Bar Association's Competition Law Section and the Foreign Investment Review Committee and has assisted in preparing submissions to the Government of Canada in connection with amendments to Canada's foreign investment laws. Catherine is also actively involved in the American Bar Association (Antitrust, International, Air & Space Law) and the International Bar Association.
