The taxpayer had received a taxable benefit upon being given a parking pass by his employer. Dawson JA found that the trial judge had taken into account the principle in Hoefele that "to be taxable as a benefit, a receipt must confer an economic advantage on the employee" and the principle in Lowe that "if an employee receives an economic advantage, but the primary beneficiary of that receipt is the employer, no benefit arises under paragraph 6(1)(a)." In particular, the taxpayer received an economic benefit because, unlike other employees at the office, he did not have to pay for parking, and the trial judge had not made a palpable error in finding that the taxpayer had failed to establish that the employer was the primary beneficiary of the employee's parking pass.
As for the value of the benefit received, "the equal treatment of taxpayers is facilitated by valuing their benefits at their fair market value" (para. 47). Here, the value of the benefit received was the retail price for a parking pass at the parking facility.