The taxpayer transferred assets of a business to a partnership in what was intended to be an s. 97(2) rollover transactions in consideration for cash, promissory notes and assumption of debt ("boot") totalling an amount less than the cost amount of the transferred assets, and a Class "F" partnership interest stipulated to have a value equal to the balance of the purchase price. The partnership used cash (derived in part from a third party who had subscribed for ¾ of the equity in the partnership) to subscribe for preferred shares of a sister company of the taxpayer ("Holdings"), with Holdings in turn using the proceeds to subscribe for preferred shares of holding companies ("Holdcos") for the various indirect individual shareholders of the taxpayer. A "back-flow preventor" clause in the Partnership Agreement provided that in the event that the partnership received any payments in respect of preferred securities held by the partnership, the partnership would make distributions to the holders of Class F units equalling such payments received.
In finding that the $18.7 million payment made by the Partnership to Holdings ostensibly as consideration for preference shares of Holdings was not additional consideration to the taxpayer for the business assets transferred by it to the Partnership, Bonner J. noted (at p. 3012) that the Crown had admitted in its pleadings that the Class F units received by the taxpayer together with the boot was equal to the fair market value of the transferred assets. Accordingly there was "no room for even a penny of additional consideration when the legal form of the transaction governed".