Clive Palmer reckons he’ll get by on $30m-$40m a year

Clive Palmer says he is a “happy ­chappy” who still has $40 million a year to live off and “have a good time”.

Clive Palmer arrives at Parliament House yesterday. Picture: Ray Strange

Clive Palmer insists he is not at all worried about his wealth being slashed by the plunging iron ore price, saying he is a “happy ­chappy” who still has $40 million a year to live off and “have a good time”.

The Palmer United leader, who skipped parliament last week to go to Japan, was back in Canberra yesterday as the member for ­Fairfax although he announced he was “not really a politician”.

Later, he told journalists his primary focus was on being an MP “serving the Australian people”, adding that he would have his own policies to announce on budget night and revealing he was planning a nationwide tour to promote PUP policies.

Mr Palmer said he had “no concern at all” about the state of his ­finances after The Australian revealed his wealth was shrinking almost daily as the price of iron ore collapsed, putting his royalties from the Sino Iron project in Western Australia in doubt.

“I’ve got enough money to sleep in a bed at night, to have a good time, I’m pretty happy,” Mr Palmer said. “I can live on $30m or $40m a year, I can be all right with that. Of course, everyone’s interested about my financial status, but it’s fine. I haven’t got any debts, I’ve got billions of dollars of assets so I’m a happy chappy.”

His Chinese business partner in Sino Iron, Citic Pacific, last night announced an estimated $2.2 billion writedown on the ­project in the Pilbara, which forced it to post a reduction in profit for last year. Citic Pacific said it was also seeking fresh investment opportunities in Australia’s resources sector despite its ongoing legal battles with Mr Palmer.

Asked why three of his companies — Mineralogy, QNI Metals and QNI Resources — had failed to lodge financial statements with the Australian Securities & Investment Commission, due in October, Mr Palmer said: “I don’t know. I’m not a director of any of the companies so I’ve got no idea. I’m a member of parliament serving the Australian people, ­giving away my wages to charity. That’s my main concern.”

But ASIC records show Mr Palmer was listed as a director of two of the three companies — QNI Metals and QNI Resources — between January 22 and February 16 when he stepped in for his nephew, who was campaigning for the PUP in the Queensland election.

Details of Mr Palmer’s myster­ious trip to Japan also began to emerge, with the PUP leader saying he ditched parliament to discuss “international affairs” and ponder the budget. “I was in Tokyo last week with Bill Clinton and with the Prime Minister of Japan, Mr (Shinzo) Abe, at a function, also with four other former Japanese prime ministers and the ambassador for the US to Japan, Caroline Kennedy, discussing some international affairs,” he said.

“When Tony Abbott goes away for a week ... talking with world leaders, it doesn’t seem to worry, but when I do it seems to be a great national event.”

Mr Palmer said he had to “lock himself away” and put some effort into the budget, so when he was not talking to public figures or economists he brainstormed the party’s future policies. “It was important that I had some time to put some effort into the budget to see what should be done for this nation,” he said. “It was important to get that together in a concise way rather than sit here (and) have endless divisions which were going nowhere.”

Facing parliament for the first time since Glenn Lazarus quit the PUP, Mr Palmer said the sole remaining PUP senator, Zhenya Wang, “is always in charge” .

“I’m his servant, I do whatever he wants to do because he’s a bright guy, he’s much smarter than me and he’s on the uptake more than I am. He’s convinced me on a whole lot of positions, he’s made me change from a dinosaur into a more enlightened person.”