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Peter S. Grant is Counsel at McCarthy Tétrault LLP, one of Canada’s largest law firms, and past chair of its Technology, Communications and Intellectual Property Group. He is also Adjunct Professor at the Faculty of Law, University of Toronto.
Mr. Grant is an expert on communications law, copyright law, and cultural and trade policy. He has pioneered the field of communications law in Canada, and his practice is substantially devoted to this field, including broadcasting and cable television, pay and specialty programming services, new media, copyright collectives, and cultural industries. He is an experienced copyright lawyer, with multiple appearances before the Copyright Board of Canada. He has also acted on matters affecting book and magazine publishing policy, film and television production and the music industries. He is also is an expert on cultural industries and international trade policy, and has spoken widely on cultural policy issues in conferences around the world, including London, Brussels, Rabat, Cape Town, Valencia, Berlin, Montego Bay, Washington, Port of Spain, Hong Kong, Sydney and Auckland. He has also advised a number of foreign governments and public broadcasters on broadcast matters, including the BBC (Britain) and RAI (Italy).
Mr. Grant is the author of numerous articles and publications, including Blockbusters and Trade Wars: Popular Culture in a Globalized World, co-authored with Chris Wood and the Canadian Broadcasting Regulatory Handbook, the eleventh edition of which was published in 2012. The handbook is the standard reference in Canada on the Broadcasting Act (Canada) and the regulations and policies of the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC).
In the period from 1974 to 1978, Mr. Grant was loaned by McCarthy Tétrault to the CRTC under an Executive Exchange Agreement. During this period he acted as a Special Counsel to the Commission and performed duties as counsel in numerous broadcasting and telecommunications regulatory proceedings
His latest publication is Changing Channels: Confessions of a Canadian Communications Lawyer, The Porcupine’s Quill Press, 2013 – an autobiography.
