5/28/2020 E-Library - Information At Your Fingertips: Printer Friendly To put an end to this, the Court, in St. Martin Funeral Homes v. NLRC (St. Martin),[11] opted to change the procedure of review of labor cases, taking into account the judicial hierarchy of courts. Thus, the Court decreed that the proper recourse from the NLRC's final and executory ruling is to assail the ruling before the CA under Rule 65. Without altering the unappealable character of the NLRC ruling that substantive law provides,[12] the Court thereby sought to improve the process by which labor cases - most of which are highly factual in character - can reach the Highest Court of the land, whose time is better devoted to matters within its exclusive jurisdiction and to issues that significantly impact on the nation as a whole. Under St. Martin, a party who loses in the CA or is dissatisfied with the CA ruling, is given the further option to file an appeal with the Supreme Court through a petition for review on certiorari under Rule 45 of the Rules of Court (Rule 45). Expressly stated under Rule 45 is that the review it provides is not a matter of right but of sound judicial discretion. Too, this mode of appeal limits the review to questions of law. Obviously, the Court did not intend this discretion to be an unbridled discretion one. [13] The approximate metes and bounds of the express limitations under Rule 45 - that only questions of law may be raised and that the Court may entertain the petition and exceptionally undertake a review of factual questions based on "sound judicial discretion"- are, however, not clearly defined in St. Martin. In fact, cases decided before or after St. Martin almost uniformly hold that: The rule is that factual findings of quasi-judicial agencies such as the NLRC are generally accorded not only respect, but at times, even finality because of the special knowledge and expertise gained by these agencies from handling matters falling under their specialized jurisdiction. It is also settled that this Court is not a trier of facts and does not normally embark in the evaluation of evidence adduced during trial. This rule, however, allows for exceptions. One of these exceptions covers instances when the findings of fact of the trial court, or of the quasi-judicial agencies concerned, are conflicting or contradictory with those of the CA. When there is a variance in the factual findings it is incumbent upon the Court to re-examine the facts once again.[14] (emphases and underscores ours, citations omitted) In other words, the existence of conflict in the factual findings and/or conclusions at any stage of the case, from the LA to the CA, makes it incumbent upon the Court to conduct a review of the records to determine which of them should be preferred as more conformable to evidentiary facts. This is what the ponencia expressly relied upon in undertaking an independent review. With this approach, the Court obviously considered the Rule 65 petition route to the CA only in light of the doctrine of hierarchy of courts and disregarded the final and unappealable character of the NLRC elibrary.judiciary.gov.ph/thebookshelf/showdocsfriendly/1/56605 15/31