The Queensland government has fast-tracked a new environmental licence for the Queensland Nickel refinery, clearing the way for Clive Palmer to make good on a vow to rehire 550 workers amid his haphazard efforts to keep the business afloat.
On Friday the state Department of Environment and Heritage Protection transferred an environmental authority from the plant’s collapsed former operator, Queensland Nickel Pty Ltd (QN), to the new operator, Queensland Nickel Sales (QNS).
Palmer had said earlier that he could not offer contracts to workers who were due to be sacked by QN hours later until the government granted several licences to run the refinery.
Palmer companies that own the Yabulu plant dumped QN as operator and installed QNS on Monday in a surprise corporate manoeuvre to access a potential $23m loan unavailable to QN.
But the new operator did not apply for an environmental authority or a major hazards licence to run the plant until days later.
Administrators of QN, FTI Consulting, have been keeping workers on and the plant going in a bid to prepare the collapsed business for a possible sale.
But after QN lost control of the operations, the administrators were forced to tell workers they would be sacked on Friday at 5pm unless QNS offered them new contracts.
The Queensland environment minister, Steven Miles, who had criticised Palmer for not bothering to apply for the licence until days after warnings from the environment department, said his request to expedite the application left “no environmental impediments to the plant’s continuing operation”.
“I trust Mr Palmer now does the right thing by his workers and ensures their employment is as protected as it can be in the circumstances,” he said.
“EA transfers can be a relatively simple process if done correctly and are not uncommon in the minerals sector – and I say again that I am surprised Mr Palmer either was not aware that the EA transfer was needed or did not care to ensure it was in place before having a new company take over the refinery.
“It is also a pity that because of this oversight refinery workers had additional cause for concern about their livelihoods.”
Palmer told the Australian Financial Review that “in the event it’s decided to bring the workforce back it will be at the 550 level, not a lower level”.
QNS still needs a major hazards licence from the industrial relations department to run the plant, which has been in maintenance and not processing nickel since 1 March amid supply issues.
The department has not received a reply after it asked QNS for more information about its licence application on Thursday, the Australian reported.
Palmer said workers would receive a letter at noon on Friday to “update them on the whole situation”.
The federal opposition leader, Bill Shorten, said in Townsville that he had asked Palmer about his plans for Queensland Nickel but the federal parliamentarian and mining baron had not given a straightforward answer.
Shorten and the Queensland treasurer, Curtis Pitt, have called on the federal government to extend its fair entitlements guarantee scheme to workers already owed $30.8m, including 237 made redundant days before QN went into administration.
The Australian Manufacturing Workers Union has said the employees have been put through a “whirlwind of uncertainty and hurt”.
