GR L 18901; (June, 1967) (Digest)
G.R. No. L-18901 June 30, 1967
Kabankalan Sugar Company, Inc. and Avelino Narcue, petitioners, vs. Court of Industrial Relations and Visayas Workers and Farmers Association-PLUM, respondents.
FACTS
Petitioner Kabankalan Sugar Company, Inc. operates Hacienda Kalasa, a sugar cane plantation. Respondent Visayas Workers and Farmers Association-PLUM (PLUM), a legitimate labor organization with members working in the hacienda, sent collective bargaining proposals to the company in December 1958. The company refused to negotiate, leading PLUM to file an unfair labor practice complaint with the Court of Industrial Relations (CIR). The company assailed the CIR’s jurisdiction, arguing the involved laborers are agricultural workers, placing the matter beyond the CIR’s authority. The CIR overruled the objection, found the company guilty of unfair labor practice, and ordered it to bargain collectively. The CIR en banc denied reconsideration, prompting this petition for review.
ISSUE
Whether the Court of Industrial Relations has jurisdiction over the unfair labor practice case involving workers in a sugar cane plantation, or if jurisdiction lies with the Court of Agrarian Relations because the workers are agricultural laborers.
RULING
The Supreme Court reversed the CIR’s resolution. It held that the CIR has no jurisdiction; the Court of Agrarian Relations has exclusive jurisdiction. The workers are agricultural laborers because Hacienda Kalasa is an agricultural land, and their principal work—planting, weeding, cutting, and loading sugar cane—constitutes ordinary farming operations. The Court rejected the CIR’s theory that the workers were industrial employees due to the integrated nature of the sugar industry under Republic Act No. 809 (Sugar Act of 1952), citing precedents (Elizalde & Co. v. Allied Worker’s Association; Victorias Milling Co., Inc. v. Court of Industrial Relations) which established that the nature of the work, not the industry’s structure, classifies a worker. The fact that the CIR may have more developed machinery for labor disputes does not confer jurisdiction where agricultural workers are involved.