He’s one of the best-known lawyers in Canada, successful and wealthy, just as controversial, and quite possibly the last guy you want to see across from you in a court of law.

He’s Tony Merchant, 40-year veteran of the legal profession and a man who has built the most recent phase of his career as a class actions crusader. The firm he founded, Regina-based Merchant Law Group, is waiting to receive the biggest legal pay day in Canadian history. Its cheque should ring in somewhere between $28 million and $43 million, resulting from years of work on the $1.9-billion settlement of the native residential schools case, a lawsuit on behalf of survivors of the state- and church-run Aboriginal education system. But it came only after a nasty squabble over the fees with the federal government that almost derailed the entire deal.

Merchant is proud of his firm’s work in righting an historic wrong and is unapologetic about the size of the payment, which he says will enable the 11-office, 50-lawyer firm to expand its class actions activity. “We’ll just keep practising until it’s all gone. It gives us a lot of staying power in class proceedings,” he says. “What ought to be depressing for lawyers everywhere, if it is the largest fee [in the history of Canada’s legal profession], is that some bank presidents make that much every year. I think many lawyers make a greater contribution,” he says.

A former journalist, Merchant has often used the media to help build his profile and promote his clients’ cases in the court of public opinion. He says he has spent much of his career challenging long-held beliefs in the legal profession. “I’m a judicial iconoclast. I’m iconoclastic about everything. I don’t just accept something just because somebody says it. I don’t accept the standard pattern,” he says.

For example, he says he doesn’t think class actions are in the best interests of Canadians if lawyers are getting along and working together. “If I were the judiciary, I’d be trying to encourage competition to make things move more quickly,” he says.

Merchant, who had spent much of his career as a family lawyer, admits to “tumbling” into class proceedings in the early ’90s. The first class action launched by his firm was a 1991 family-law matter for child deductibility and women’s child support. Two years later, he launched one over breast implants and the firm has gathered steam since. Merchant says the firm typically has 80 to 100 ongoing class proceedings.

He is quick to respond to criticism his firm has faced for landing actions outside of Saskatchewan. “Because I live in Regina, our firm, to an unfair extent, is perceived as being a Saskatchewan law firm. But we have more lawyers in Alberta than we do in Saskatchewan,” he says, noting the firm also counts lawyers in Quebec, B.C., Alberta, and Saskatchewan who spend either all or a significant portion of their time on class proceedings.

Merchant says he sees class action legislation as similar to the Tax Court, Federal Court, or the Supreme Court of Canada. “If I were in front of a judge in Winnipeg, I’d say, ‘You’re not a Winnipeg judge, you’re not a Manitoba judge, you shouldn’t expect to have Manitoba counsel. In this case, you’re a Canadian judge, because this is a class action involving Canadians,” he says. “Just the same as when I appear in the Supreme Court in Ottawa, they don’t say, ‘You’re not an Ottawa lawyer.’ If you look in the U.S., the class action firms may live somewhere, but they argue the cases wherever it’s appropriate and good for the class.”

Merchant, 62, has been employing his unique modus operandi since he started articling as a 22-year-old, after having earned an arts degree then a law degree from the University of Saskatchewan. He also has an MBA from the University of Regina. Merchant says he “fell into” radio and began hosting an open-line show on the CBC at the same time as his law career was getting off the ground. “It was really like having two 40-hour jobs,” he says, noting because of the frenetic pace in those years, he stopped eating breakfast and lunch.

“I came down to four hours of sleep. Everything I could do was designed to save time. The courts were wonderful with me; they would let me start trials at 11 o’clock in the morning instead of 10. People were very accommodating. At the same time, I did stringer work for the CBC.”

Now on the other side of the microphone, Merchant says he thinks newspaper, radio, and television reporters appreciate his candour and ability to not simply blather on. “Unlike most lawyers, I think I give real answers. If you asked me a question for a national telecast, I’d give about a 12-second answer. If it was for a local telecast, I’d give about a 22-second answer,” he says.

“If you ask a lawyer to describe that jacket,” he says, pointing to an imaginary piece of clothing. “They will say, ‘It has green and red diagonal and horizontal lines with varying shades and threads that go up and down and take a circular motion around the shoulders.’ If you ask Tony Merchant, he’ll say, ‘It’s a plaid jacket.’ ”