Whatever, boasts Clive Palmer, I’ve got four more jets

Clive Palmer has boasted that he has five jets even as one is being put up for sale by administrators.

Clive Palmer has boasted that he has five jets even as one is being put up for sale by administrators to his aviation company.

Mr Palmer, whose Queensland Nickel refinery in north Queensland is also in administration, told Sky News last night that he hoped the money could help keep workers at the refinery in their jobs.

“I’ve taken the decision, having five jets, that I should let one jet go for the benefit of our workforce so we can deploy that money keeping families employed,” he said.

With Palmer Aviation owing $26m and administrators expecting the plane to fetch between $10 million and $15m, he conceded there might still be some debt in the company, however, QNI had assets of $2 billion “and I’m sure they are quite capable of meeting that debt no problem’’.

Mr Palmer described claims he acted as a “shadow director’’ of QNI as “rubbish’’ even as he conceded he was a member of a six-person committee that approved purchases of more than $500 by the company. He also confirmed he had used an email account under the name of Terry Smith.

Mr Palmer revealed he had considered a switch to the Senate, but was still intending to contest his Sunshine Coast seat of Fairfax at the next election.

He described polls showing his support at only 2 per cent as “rigged’’ and said the troubles at QNI were having “zero’’ impact on the Palmer United Party’s political fortunes.

However, he said, this did not mean he was acting as a director of the company. “I’ve followed the law,’’ Mr Palmer said.

Mr Palmer used the interview to defend donations made by QNI to PUP, declaring “any money that was donated was money that was mine’’.

He defended more than $6m in donations that were made by QNI to PUP.

“I’m in business to make money. I’m allowed to use the profits to pay myself a dividend,’’ Mr Palmer said.

He said he was entitled to have the dividend used as a donation.

Mr Palmer said in the years QNI donated to PUP it was “100 per cent solvent’’ and had ­assets of $1.9bn. He said no donations had been made to PUP after ­September last year, when the nickel price began to crash.

The company had been placed in administration “because we had a high obligation to keep over 2000 people employed’’, Mr Palmer said.

He predicted that QNI would ultimately come out of administration and be successful.

He said it was the administrators who had frozen the workers’ entitlements. “People will be paid their full entitlements and our strategy will be vindicated.’

Administrators at QNI also this week revealed that Mr Palmer’s central Queensland cattle station was at the top of a long “hit list” of assets marked to be sold quickly.