Employees of Petro-Canada who were required to relocate from Calgary to Toronto had a declining percentage of their increased interest costs (resulting from an increase in their outstanding mortgages of no more that 55%) subsidized by Petro-Canada provided they took out their new mortgage with Confederation Life.
Linden J.A. noted (at p. 5608) that the phrases "because of" or "as a consequence of" in s. 80.4(1) required "a strong causal connection" and went on to find that because the employees (who already had Calgary homes) obtained their new form of mortgage financing largely independently of employer involvement, it was reasonable to consider that the new mortgage debt was incurred "in order to obtain ownership of a house, not ... 'as a consequence of'... employment".