A charity cannot carry on a business unless it is a “related business”, which is a business that is related to the objects of the charity and that employs only volunteers.
After the decision in Alberta Institute on Mental Retardation v. The Queen, [1987] 2 C.T.C. 70, (F.C.A.), it could be argued that any business would be related to the objects of a charity if all profits of the business were devoted to the charity’s objects. The Federal Court of Appeal, however, has since gone out of its way to reject this proposition in two cases, the most recent being The House of Holy God v. Canada (Attorney General), 2009 FCA 148 at ¶6.
