He/Him
Since 1990, Scott Sweatman’s expertise has included pensions, benefits, executive compensation, and related tax law. As the leader of Pensions, Benefits & Executive Compensation at Dentons Canada LLP, Scott helps clients establish and sustain pension, benefit, and deferred compensation plans, providing counsel on regulatory compliance, pension, governance, and funding issues, as well as the impact of mergers and acquisitions on these plans. From a tax perspective, he works with clients to develop executive and deferred compensation plans, and advises them on issues around stock options, retiring allowances, profit sharing, and corporate reorganizations. Scott also assists professional athletes in establishing retirement compensation arrangements. He also acts as an arbitrator in public sector pension plan disputes.
Scott assists national and multi-national clients, as well as multi-employer plan sponsors, with provincial, federal, and Income Tax Act compliance. For over fifteen years, he worked as a senior consultant with two major multinational actuarial and accounting firms. With this experience, he is uniquely positioned to provide strategic legal consulting advice in tandem with professionals from the actuarial and accounting professions.
Scott is the past co-chair of the Alberta-British Columbia Joint Expert Panel on Pension Standards, working with five of Alberta and British Columbia’s leading experts in pensions to review pension legislation in the two provinces and make recommendations to both governments for fundamental reforms to pension legislation. He is past national and regional chair of the Canadian Pension & Benefits Institute, past chair of the Pension, Benefits and Compensation Section of the Canadian Bar Association (British Columbia), past chair of the Corporate Counsel Section of the Canadian Bar Association (British Columbia), former member of the Pension Advisory Council to the British Columbia Government, and former member of the Trustee Act Modernization Committee of British Columbia.
Scott served on the Board of Directors of NAV Canada from 2010 to January 2022, Canada’s national private sector civil navigation services provider which has pension plan assets in excess of $7 billion. He is a past member and past chair of NAV’s Pension Committee and past member of their Corporate Governance Committee.
Scott is recognized in the 2011 to 2024 editions of The Best Lawyers in Canada in the area of Employee Benefits Law. He is also recognized by Chambers Global (2013 to 2024) and Chambers Canada (2016 to 2024) as a leading lawyer in the area of Pensions & Benefits. Scott is consistently recommended by the Canadian Legal Lexpert Directory, Pensions and Employee Benefits. He has been practising law since 1987.
