‘Good boss’ Clive Palmer turns out to have feet of clay

At least one of Clive Palmer’s 800 sacked refinery workers regrets the former largesse.

Twin Brothers

When Clive Palmer threw a lavish Christmas party and gifted his Queensland Nickel workers ­Mercedes cars and Fijian holidays in 2010, David Barrett and his ­colleagues thought they’d been blessed by a “good boss”.

“We thought he appreciated his workers and was willing to reward them, but we soon found out that was wrong,” Mr Barrett said.

The process operator worked at the Yabulu nickel refinery for 11 years before being made redundant last month, one of nearly 800 to lose their jobs in the collapse of the Townsville business.

The 48-year-old is owed $111,000 in entitlements, and is ­appealing for the federal government’s Fair Entitlements Guarantee scheme to kick in as swiftly as possible.

“My bank has given me a six- month reprieve on my mortgage repayments, but I’ve still got bills piling up: credit cards, store cards, my monthly home insurance,” he told The Australian. “I’ve had to put a hold on my health insurance because I’m ­worried I can’t pay the bill; that’s $130 a month I can’t ­afford. Then there’s rates, electricity, my phone.”

His three daughters, aged ­between nine and 14, live with their mother in Ingham, 110km north of Townsville. “She’s lost $1400 a month from me; take that from anyone’s income and they’re going to feel it,” he said.

Administrators yesterday ­re­ported the nickel refinery would still be operating if Mr Palmer had not ­siphoned hundreds of millions of dollars from the refinery’s coffers to Palmer-owned companies, and then forgiven the loans.

GRAPHIC: Palmer transactions

“It’s disgusting,” Mr Barrett said. “When Clive first took over (from BHP Billiton in 2009), he came out to the refinery and told us for the first five years he wasn’t going to take any money out of the business.

“He said that money would carry us through the downtimes in the nickel price. But straight away we could see he wasn’t doing that.

“First was the lavish Christmas party, then he started buying ­resorts and building dinosaurs. The downturn in nickel price comes and then guess what? The gates shut.”

Mr Barrett said he would give back his Fijian holiday “in a heartbeat” if it meant he had a steady job again. Townsville’s unemployment rate is 8.3 per cent, and with nearly 800 ex-refinery workers looking for jobs, there are slim pickings. Mr Barrett is hunting for a job, and is considering joining the Army Reserve.

For him, the only bright spark is volunteering with a group of ex-workers who are delivering food parcels to former colleagues struggling to feed their families.