Dan Black

Dan was a partner in the employment and labour law practice group of another national law firm where he practiced for 10 years until 2006, when he joined Closing the Gap Healthcare Group as Vice President, Legal and Business Development.

In this role, he provided in-house legal advice and acted as executive lead in responding to the Ontario government's managed competition process for home and community-based healthcare services.

Dan has extensive experience in all areas of employment and labour law, including an in-depth knowledge of occupational health and safety law, workers' compensation law, and independent contractor versus employee relationships.

He regularly drafts and interprets employment, independent contractor, consulting, and restrictive covenant agreements and regularly advises employers on:

• employment terminations
• wrongful dismissal actions
• employment standards claims
• human rights issues and complaints
• collective agreement negotiations
• occupational health and safety issues (including legislative requirements, work refusals, inspections, workplace accidents, and prosecutions)
• workers' compensation matters (including worker claims and employer classification appeals)
• independent contractor issues
• employment aspects of corporate transactions

He has assisted employers to:

• recover over a million dollars in excess workers' compensation premiums
• retain the ongoing right to six-figure refunds of workers' compensation premiums following a business reorganization
• avoid prosecutions under the Occupational Health and Safety Act
• significantly reduce retroactive liability for Canada Pension Plan contributions and employment insurance premiums
• centralize multi-hospital business and supply chain processes
• avoid unionization
• negotiate significant revisions to a collective agreement to enable a business to return to profitability,
• avoid union successor rights in the context of business transactions.