Background
Ian Houston is the Regional Practice Group Leader for the Toronto office of the Construction, Engineering, Surety and Fidelity Group; in addition he is a member of the Public-Private Infrastructure Projects Group and the International Construction Projects Group of Borden Ladner Gervais LLP. He graduated from Queen's University in 1988 with his Bachelor of Laws degree, and prior to that, he majored in political science and history; he received his Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Toronto in 1985. Mr. Houston was admitted to the Ontario Bar in 1990.
Areas of Practice
- Mr. Houston has specialized in the area of construction, surety law and procurement from the beginning of his career, and devotes his entire practice to those areas. He is a senior member of both the Construction, Engineering, Surety and Fidelity Law Practice Group and the Infrastructure and Public-Private Partnership Group.
- Mr. Houston's practice ranges from providing commercial law advice on contractual and procurement issues to assisting clients in resolving disputes through litigation or alternative dispute resolution methods.
Professional Experience
- Mr. Houston's experience includes:
- Providing general commercial and procurement law advice, including drafting RFPs, RFQs, RFEOIs and other forms of tender documents.
- Representing public bodies such as hospitals and educational institutions in respect of major construction and infrastructure projects, including providing advice in respect of construction agreements, OHSA issues, claims avoidance, and resolution of construction claims.
- Negotiating, drafting and reviewing of various forms of commercial agreements such as construction contracts, project agreements, P3 agreements, architectural services agreements, engineering agreements, lending agreements and operation and maintenance agreements.
- Representing developers, owners, contractors and others in respect of all forms of renewable and non-renewable energy projects including, without limitation, natural gas, CHP, hydro, wind, landfill gas, coal, energy from waste, nuclear, oil, orimulsion and other types of power projects.
- Representing hospitals and other health care institutions in negotiations with Infrastructure Ontario, the Ministry of Health and Long Term Care and the Ministry of Public Infrastructure Renewal regarding project delivery, procurement issues, obtaining approvals, risk sharing, funding, project documentation and a range of other issues.
- Providing advice to owners and other parties in relation to procurement and tendering law issues.
- Representing owners, contractors, subcontractors and engineers in relation to prosecuting or defending a wide variety of construction related claims.
- Providing legal advice for banks and other lending institutions with respect to construction projects, including mortgage liability and trust liability under The Construction Lien Act.
- Advising surety companies with respect to a wide variety of issues arising out of surety bonding, including defence of surety bond claims, negotiating and drafting commercial agreements such as completion agreements, mitigation agreements and forbearance agreements, providing opinions regarding coverage issues, and participating in alternate dispute resolution.
Professional and Community Activities
- Member of the Executive Committee of the Construction Section of the Canadian Bar Association
- Member of the Executive Committee of the Construction Section of the Ontario Bar Association
- Member of the Advocates Society
- Member of the Toronto Construction Association
- Affiliate member of the Canadian Surety Association
- Affiliate member of The Canadian Council on Public-Private Partnerships
- Affiliate Member of the Canadian Nuclear Law Organization
- Authored and co-authored numerous papers on construction and surety law issues including being a contributing author to a leading text on construction surety law, Scott and Reynolds on Surety Bonds, Carswell, December 1993 and a contributing author to the soon to be published American Bar Association text on International Construction Law
- Frequent speaker at legal conferences on construction, procurement and surety related issues for the Ontario Hospital Association, Canadian Institute, Lexpert, Lorman, The Toronto Construction Association, EPIC and others
- Lecturer on construction law issues at University of Toronto Law School, University of Toronto School of Architecture and George Brown College
