Clive Palmer vows to repay sacked Queensland Nickel workers

Clive Palmer’s delayed offer to pay entitlements owed to former employees criticised by liquidator.

Clive Palmer is attempting a political comeback. Picture: AAP.

The special purpose liquidator appointed to claw back taxpayer funds from the collapsed Queensland Nickel has slammed Clive Palmer’s delayed offer to pay outstanding entitlements owed to former employees.

Mr Palmer this morning announced plans to pay back “millions of dollars” owed to workers at Queensland Nickel more than three years after the Townsville refinery company collapsed.

About 800 workers lost their jobs when Queensland Nickel was liquidated in 2016, sparking questions about whether Mr Palmer and his family deliberately drained the company of funds before it collapsed.

A spokesman Mr Palmer told The Australian the promised payment related to redundancy entitlements not covered by the Federal Government’s Fair Entitlements Guarantee scheme.

Under the scheme, $66.86 million in taxpayer money was paid to Queensland Nickel workers to cover their redundancy packages.

The special purpose liquidator appointed to recoup the Commonwealth funds said employees whose full redundancy package was not covered by the government scheme were still owed $7.16 million.

Special purpose liquidator Stephen Parbery was earlier unclear as to whether Mr Palmer intended to repay the $66.18 million or cover the $7.16 million.

Mr Parbery said the payments should be made immediately.

“The offer to repay outstanding employee entitlements is welcomed and will assist to minimise the adverse financial impact caused by the failure of Queensland Nickel,” Mr Parbery said in a statement.

“However, it is disappointing that Mr Palmer’s offer to at long last redress the employees has taken over three years and hasn’t been extended to the small businesses located in the Townsville region who have been equally affected by the flooding that has had such a dramatic effect on the region.

“Instead, Mr Palmer has been offering payments that can only be described as paltry to the affected small businesses in the Townsville area.”

In a statement, Mr Palmer said it was the administrators of Queensland Nickel who dismissed 546 of the refinery’s employees and accused them of doing it for “political gain”.

But Mr Parbery hit back, saying Mr Palmer’s nephew Clive Mensink – the director of Queensland Nickel - made 218 QNI employees redundant three days before he placed the company into voluntary administration.

A Supreme Court trial to recover $200 million in claims against Queensland Nickel is scheduled for July 15 and expected to run for 45 days.

Clive Palmer says he will now pay back what's owed to workers who were sacked when Queensland Nickel went bust three years ago. (No mention of the businesses who were owed money - yet.) #auspol #qldpol pic.twitter.com/Ch0zZa5r4C

— Josh Bavas (@JoshBavas) April 14, 2019

The announcement came today as Mr Palmer attempts a political comeback at the helm of his self-styled United Australia Party.

The businessman has insisted he would stand for the House of Representatives in the Townsville-based seat of Herbert, but there is mounting speculation he could run for the Senate instead.

“Townsville’s certainly been doing it tough and difficult since the floods and we want to look forward and not backwards,” Mr Palmer said.

“For that reason I’ve decided today that we will pay out all outstanding amounts in workers’ entitlements that was owed by Queensland Nickel.”

Mr Palmer has repeatedly refused to take responsibility for the sackings.

“This is despite the fact that we never sacked anybody and the administrators moved in to sack the workforce and to close the refinery operations down at a time when we were ready to pay all the workforce and to transfer them and to operate the refinery,” he said.

Taxpayers stepped up to cover the entitlements of many sacked workers, prompting the federal government to appoint the special purpose liquidator to chase Mr Palmer for the money.

Mr Palmer’s finances have improved markedly since 2017, when he won a court victory over estranged Chinese business partner Citic.

Mr Palmer’s announcement came amid a looming Supreme Court trial instigated by lawyers for Mr Parbury, who was appoint­ed­ by the Turnbull government to recoup about $70 million paid to Queensland Nickel employees under the Fair Entitlements Guarantee Scheme.

In that court case, Mr Parbury was set to call key witnesses to testify about the businessman’s pleas in 2015 for a taxpayer-funded loan to prop up the business.

Mr Palmer had previously sought to defend himself in court, claiming to have been subjected to a political smear campaign. However, Mr Parbery has argued the claims are frivolous and an abuse of process intended by Mr Palmer to delay the trial.

The liquidator’s lawyers have said it would take a significant amount of time to obtain evidence to defend­ the “asserted conspiracy”, meaning the trial, which has already been delayed several times, could be further adjourned.

It was unclear what impact Mr Palmer’s announcement would have on the court case.

Mr Palmer, who represents himself, did not appear in court last Wednesday after emailing Justice Jackson’s associate a day earlier, saying he was unwell.