Moises De Leon v. NLRC and La Tondeña (G.R. No.

70705)

Facts:

Petitioner De Leon was employed by respondent company La Tondeña as

maintenance man whose work consisted mainly of painting company building and
equipment, and other odd jobs relating to maintenance. After having worked for respondent
for more than a year, petitioner requested that he be included in the payroll of regular
employees, to which the former responded by dismissing petitioner from his employment.
Petitioner having been refused reinstatement filed a complaint before the Labor Arbiter.
Petitioner asserts that he is a regular employee performing similar functions as of a regular
maintenance and was rehired by respondent company’s labor agency to perform the same
tasks. Respondent company meanwhile claims petitioner was a casual worker hired only
to paint a certain building in the premises and that his work as painter terminated upon
completion of the job. The Labor Arbiter ruled in favor of petitioner but was reversed on
appeal by the NLRC tribunal.

Issue:

Whether or not petitioner De Leon is a regular employee of respondent.

Ruling: YES.

The primary standard, therefore, of determining a regular employment is the reasonable

connection between the particular activity performed by the employee in relation to the
usual business or trade of the employer. The test is whether the former is usually necessary
or desirable in the usual business or trade of the employer.

It is not tenable to argue that the painting and maintenance work of petitioner are not
necessary in respondent’s business of manufacturing liquors and wines, just as it cannot be
said that only those who are directly involved in the process of producing wines and liquors
may be considered as necessary employees. Otherwise, there would have been no need for
the regular Maintenance Section of respondent company’s Engineering Department,
manned by regular employees whom petitioner often worked with.

The law demands that the nature and entirety of the activities performed by the employee
be considered. In the case of petitioner, the painting and maintenance work given him
manifest a treatment consistent with a maintenance man and not just a painter, for if his job
was truly only to paint a building there would have been no basis for giving him other work
assignments in between painting activities.

Furthermore, the petitioner performed his work of painting and maintenance activities
during his employment in respondent’s business which lasted for more than one year.
Certainly, by this fact alone he is entitled by law to be considered a regular employee. And
considering further that weeks after his dismissal, petitioner was rehired by the company
through a labor agency and was returned to his post in the Maintenance Section and made
to perform the same activities that he used to do, it cannot be denied that as activities as a
regular painter and maintenance man still exist.
 G.R. No. 71664, February 28, 1992
Baguio Country Club vs. NLRC

Facts:

Baguio Country Club Corporation filed with the Ministry of Labor office an application for clearance to
terminate the services of respondent Jimmy Sajonas for willful breach of trust, telling lies in an investigation,
taking money paid by customers, threatening a fellow employee, committing dishonesty against guests and
committing four violations of the club rules and regulations which would constitute valid grounds for
dismissal. Sajonas then filed his opposition alleging that his dismissal was without justifiable grounds to
support it and that it would contravene his constitutional right to security of tenure.

After an investigation, the Regional Director suspended Sajonas and indorsed the case for compulsory
arbitration to Labor Arbiter Benigno Ayson. The labor arbiter however reversed the decision for insufficiency
of evidence and ordered the reinstatement of Sajonas. On appeal, the NLRC also affirmed the decision of
Labor Arbiter.

Petitioner then filed a petition contending that it was denied due process as its evidence was not considered
by both the labor arbiter and the NLRC. The petitioner states that as a result of this ignoring of its evidence,
the decisions of the public respondents are contrary to the facts and the applicable law.

Issue:

Whether the petitioner was denied of due process as its evidence was not considered.

Ruling:

YES. The petitioner was denied of due process. The respondent Commission which affirmed the order to
reinstate Mr. Sajonas was based only on the evidence available to the labor arbiter when he decided the
case in which it had not sufficiently shown a just cause for the complainant's dismissal.

The respondent Commission committed grave abuse of discretion when it affirmed the irregular and one-
sided procedure adopted by the labor arbiter in arriving at his finding of insufficiency of evidence and when
it decided to uphold a decision not only contrary to the facts but obviously unfair and unjust. The irregular
procedure of labor arbiter is that it allowed a last minute position paper of respondent Sajonas to be filed
and without requiring a copy to be served upon the Baguio Country Club and without affording the latter an
opportunity to refute or rebut the contents of the paper, forthwith decided the case.

Thus, the instant petition is a timely reminder to labor arbiters and all who wield quasi-judicial power to ever
bear in mind that evidence is the means, sanctioned by rules, of ascertaining in a judicial or quasi-judicial
proceeding, the truth respecting a matter of fact. The object of evidence is to establish the truth by the use
of perceptive and reasoning faculties. The statutory grant of power to use summary procedures should
heighten a concern for due process, for judicial perspective in administrative decision making, and for
maintaining the visions which led to the creation of the administrative office.