The jurisdiction of the Canada Labour Relations Board to determine whether the Communications Workers of Canada could be certified as bargaining agent for supervisors employed by Northern Telecom Ltd. ("Telecom") in its western Ontario installation division turned on whether that installation department was part of any work, undertaking or business within federal legislative authority. This question, in turn, rested upon determining whether the nature of the relationship between Telecom and the telephone companies its served (notably, Bell Canada, viewed as having a communications undertaking within federal jurisdiction), including the importance of the installation work done for Bell Canada and the physical and operational connections between the installation department and the core federal undertaking of Bell Canada, were such as to make the installation department part of that undertaking.
Dickson J stated (at pp. 138-139):
In determining whether a particular subsidiary operation forms an integral part of the federal undertaking, the judgment is, as was said in Arrow Transfer, a "functional, practical one about the factual character of the ongoing undertaking". Or, in the words of Mr. Justice Beetz in Montcalm, to ascertain the nature of the operation, "one must look at the normal or habitual activities of the business as those of 'a going concern', without regard for exceptional or casual factors" and the assessment of those "normal or habitual activities" calls for a fairly complete set of factual findings.
As Telecom had not brought any evidence to reveal the nature of the corporate and business relationship between it and Bell Canada, its appeal was dismissed.