Canada

Canwest’s main creditors have won backing from a majority of the company’s lenders for a plan to restructure the newspaper publishing chain, despite opposition from Chief Executive Leonard Asper, The Toronto Sun reported. According to McMillan LLP, the legal firm representing the main creditors, 135 lenders holding nearly 77% of the company’s senior secured debt have committed their support to the plan. That “surpasses both thresholds required for the restructuring plan’s approval,” the statement said.

The Canadian Automobile Dealers Association did not fight for more than 200 members told to close by General Motors last year because its interests lay with surviving retailers in the firm's restructuring, a class-action lawsuit says. Although the lawsuit on behalf of affected dealers does not name the association as a defendant, the statement of claim says the umbrella group rejected all pleas for help about their futures, The Toronto Star reported. Trillium Motor World of Toronto sued General Motors of Canada Ltd.

A Toronto car dealership has launched a $750-million class-action suit on behalf of more than 200 General Motors of Canada Ltd. dealers that seeks compensation for how GM handled the termination of their outlets last year, The Globe and Mail reported. The suit names the auto maker, law firm Cassels Brock & Blackwell LLP and two of the firm's lawyers.

Canadian bankruptcies rose 2.4 percent in November from a year earlier as consumers struggled to repay debts, but business bankruptcies were down sharply, suggesting the worst may be over for corporate insolvency, Reuters reported. The number of consumer bankruptcies in November rose 3.9 percent from November 2008 to 8,482, while business bankruptcies fell 21.7 percent to 396, the Office of the Superintendent of Bankruptcy Canada said in a report.

A competing bidder has emerged for newspapers being sold by Canwest Global Communications Corp., but it is only interested in the cream of the crop, TheDeal.com reported. A trio of media executives is planning a bid for the Ottawa Citizen, Montreal Gazette and National Post, three of the leading daily newspapers owned by the bankrupt Canadian media company, according to press reports. Their selectivity may prove a problem because CanWest and its creditors have made clear that the court-monitored auction is for all or substantially all of the newspaper assets.

Corus Entertainment Inc. is possibly interested in buying some specialty channels from Canwest Global Communications Ltd., but not other parts of its media business, Corus CEO John Cassaday said Wednesday. Corus operates a broad array specialty cable channels, including YTV, Treehouse, W Network, and Cosmopolitan TV, as well as Movie Central and HBO Canada in western Canada, The Canadian Press reported.

Swiss drug industry supplier Lonza Group said on Tuesday it was closing three chemical sites to cut costs as it grapples with a challenging economic environment, Reuters reported. Lonza will close its sites at Riverside in the United States, Shawinigan in Canada and Wokingham in Britain and will cut 175 employees, aiming to cut fixed costs by between 60 million Swiss francs ($59.1 million) and 80 million in the next 18 to 24 months, it said in a statement. The group will face total restructuring cost of approximately 140 million francs, booked into 2009.

A U.S. bankruptcy court judge approved an application Tuesday, seeking to make the controversial Canadian restructuring plan of C$32 billion in toxic asset-backed commercial paper enforceable in the U.S., Dow Jones reported. Ernst & Young, which was appointed monitor by an Ontario court in March, petitioned the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the southern district of New York to import, in its entirety, the restructuring plan under chapter 15 of the U.S. bankruptcy code. U.S. Judge Martin Glenn approved the decision, Ken Coleman of Allen & Overy LLP told Dow Jones.

Canada's industry minister approved Ciena Corp's $769 million bid for a unit of bankrupt Nortel Networks Inc. and said on Tuesday the deal was likely to be of net benefit for Canada, Reuters reported. "This investment will maintain jobs, R&D activity and corporate leadership in Canada, Industry Minister Tony Clement said in a late night statement that also noted Ciena's promise to invest in Canada.

TLC Vision Corp. has agreed to sell its six laser eye centres in Canada as part of a pre-arranged creditor protection filing on Monday that will see the eye-care company emerge as a private entity, the Financial Post reported. The centres, currently known as TLC Laser Eye Centres, will operate under the TLC Canada banner once the sale to a group of Canadian investors is completed, a spokesperson for TLC said. No details on the sale price have been released.