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Simon Archer

Simon Archer

Partner

Biography

Simon Archer works to protect the wages, working conditions and retirement security of his clients and their families. He works with trade unions, retiree associations and boards of trustees across Canada, advising on negotiating pension and benefits, trust administration and fiduciary issues, public interest litigation, insolvencies, corporate accountability and governance. He has worked with public and private sector pension and benefit plans, multi-employer plans and jointly governed and sponsored plans across Canada.

Simon is past Chair of the Stakeholder Advisory Committee of the Financial Services Regulatory Authority of Ontario. He was previously appointed by Ontario’s Minister of Finance to represent the interests of workers and unions in a review of pension funding regulations, and was previously lead researcher for the Ontario Expert Commission on Pensions.

Simon was previously appointed to the Canadian Association of Pension Supervisory Authorities’ Industry Working Group on Environmental, Social and Governance investment policy guidance for Canadian pension funds. He is also a climate governance expert with the Canada Climate Law Initiative, which works to ensure Canadian directors and trustees understand their fiduciary obligations with respect to climate change.

Since 2021, Simon has been an expert advisor to the Unifor-Mexico Workers Rights Action Project International Advisory Committee, which supports worker rights awareness and trade union capacity building in critical, export-led industrial sectors in Mexico.

Simon is recognized by his peers as a leading practitioner in pension and employee benefits in Best Lawyers, Canadian Legal Lexpert Directory, and Chambers Canada.

When not at the shop, Simon’s often trying something new. He can be found playing footie (soccer, of course) around Toronto, cooking up a new dish, or trying to stay limber practising yoga. He also might be getting grease under his fingernails by restoring antique espresso machines on his workbench. His best work was a full restoration of a 1967 Olympia Cremina, now on display in his kitchen.

Simon attended Osgoode Hall Law School and was called to the Ontario bar in 2002, but he can’t seem to stay away from school. He has taught a variety of courses at law schools at York University, McGill University, University of Western Ontario, University of Toronto, and Kings College London. He writes extensively and is co-Editor of The Daunting Enterprise of the Law, a volume dedicated to the work of Harry Arthurs, and The Contradictions of Pension Fund Capitalism, a volume on issues with pension fund investments.