Clifton P. Prophet

About Clifton P. Prophet

When a reorganization, liquidation or realization turns into a fight, Clifton P. Prophet is the kind of lawyer creditors and debtors alike call in, along with the insolvency practitioners running the file and others with a stake in the outcome. A partner at Gowling WLG in Toronto, Clifton heads the firm's Financial Institutions Litigation Group, and the practice reaches across insolvency, pensions and employment benefits. What clients get is hands-on, "nuts and bolts" experience with insolvency disputes.

Clifton was called to the Ontario bar in 1993, two years after finishing an LLB at the University of Toronto, and is also qualified as a solicitor in England and Wales. Clifton's career includes close to two years practising abroad in London, advising clients on the pension and employment side of large M&A deals that crossed several jurisdictions.

Clifton's courtroom work runs from the Ontario Superior Court of Justice and the Divisional Court through the Court of Appeal and up to the Supreme Court of Canada, and it also takes in administrative tribunals such as the Financial Services Tribunal. Outside the courtroom, Clifton has been a guest lecturer on pensions and insolvency at the University of Western Ontario and has helped write recent guides to Canadian restructuring and insolvency law.

Pensions are the other main strand of the practice. Buyers and sellers of a business get advice on the pension and employment questions a deal raises, and the trustees and administrators who run pension plans are clients too.