Ari N. Kaplan

Partner

Ari N. Kaplan is a partner in the Pension and Benefits Group at Koskie Minsky and is the author of Canada’s leading textbook on pension law. He has acted as counsel on some of Canada's most widely-known pension cases, including Kerry and Monsanto before the Supreme Court of Canada. Lexpert has recognized Ari as one of Canada’s leading 500 lawyers and he is considered a top practitioner in the area in both the Lexpert Directory and Best Lawyers in Canada.

Ari's clients include pension fund trustees, employee and pensioner groups, private and public sector trade unions and individuals. His practice has both a plaintiff and defendant litigation focus with an emphasis on pension and benefits litigation, human rights law and class actions.

In 2010, Ari was appointed by the Hon. Chris Bentley, Attorney General for Ontario, to the Board of Trustees of the Law Foundation of Ontario (lawfoundation.on.ca). The Foundation is responsible under the Law Society Act for collecting and investing the interest from 40,000 Ontario lawyer trust accounts, and using those funds to support Legal Aid Ontario, most of the law schools and law clinics in Ontario, and for other discretionary public programs that enhance public access to the Canadian justice system. Through the direction of its five trustees, the Foundation has spent almost $1 billion since 1974 toward the public good.

Ari’s textbook on Canadian pension law and regulation, Pension Law (Irwin Law: 2006) (Second Ed. currently being edited with Mitch Frazer of Torys LLP) received the 2007 Walter Owen Book Prize for outstanding new contribution to Canadian legal literature and is regularly cited as an authority by the Supreme Court of Canada, other courts and tribunals, and various law commissions.

Ari teaches pension law and is an adjunct professor of law at both the University of Toronto and Osgoode Hall Law School, and from 2006-2008 was an Assistant Professor at the University of Western Ontario.

Ari appears regularly in the media. To see Ari on CBC News defending a murderer's right to keep his military pension, click here.

Finally, Ari heads up licensing and publishing at Paper Bag Records, a leading independent record label and artist management company based in Toronto. He tweets as @arimap.

SELECTED CASES

Nolan v. Kerry (Canada) Inc., 2009 SCC 39

Monsanto Canada Inc. v. Ontario, 2004 SCC 54

Cousins v. Canada (Attorney General), 2008 FCA 226

Potter v. Bank of Canada, 2007 ONCA 234

Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan Board v. Ontario, 2004 CanLII 7628 (ON CA)

Waterston v. CBC, 2010 ONSC 4319

Paramount Pictures (Canada) Inc. v. Dillon, 2006 CanLII 19496