Creditors Meeting today

Staff and creditors of Linc Energy to meet in Brisbane today
APRIL 27, 2016 3:36PM

Helen Bender at the Chinchilla Linc Energy site, H
Anthony Marx The Courier-Mail

THE administrator of Linc Energy would like to strike a deal which would let the stricken firm stay afloat.
PPB Advisory’s Grant Sparks said that he hopes a deed of company arrangement can be approved by creditors next month.
Creditors held the their first meeting in Brisbane today, where they learned that Sparks has advertised Linc’s assets for sale and he hopes to start talks with interested parties next week.
Linc, which appointed PPB Advisory on April 15, has $US120 million in debts but Sparks said it was too early to say how much creditors might claw back.
The company also has numerous subsidiaries in the US which owe about $US370 million but there is no equity in those assets to benefit Australia creditors, he said.
About half of Linc’s 57 Australian staff have already been retrenched.
A second meeting of creditors has been scheduled for May 23, when they will decide whether to allow the company to keep trading under a scheme of arrangement or tip it in to liquidation.
Sparks said that, even though the State Government has banned Linc’s controversial “underground coal gasification’’ technology, there are still valuable intellectual property issues at play.
A month before bringing in PPB, Linc was committed to stand trial over charges that its demonstration UCG operation near Chinchilla caused widespread and irreversible contamination of 175sq km of farmland. The company denied any wrongdoing and was defending the case.
Environment Minister Steven Miles said that the Government’s recently-passed “chain of responsibility’’ legislation could be used by regulators.
“Whether and when to use any of the enforcement tools available under the law is always an operational decision, taken by the regulator, in pursuit of the object of the Environmental Protection Act,’’ Dr Miles said.
“These kinds of decisions are taken independently from the Government.’’
EARLIER: STAFF and other creditors of a controversial gas company will meet in Brisbane to learn what hope they have of getting the millions they are owed.
Today’s meeting follows Linc Energy being put into voluntary administration about two weeks ago, owing an estimated $150 million to 57 staff and 20 external creditors.
The move came after the company was recently committed for trial, accused of wilfully and unlawfully causing serious environmental harm at a trial underground coal gasification plant at Hopeland, west of Brisbane.
Just days after administrators were called in, the Queensland government said it was imposing an immediate ban on UCG activities across the state.
Environment Minister Steven Miles said Hopeland residents had suffered very serious effects from UCG activities.
“What we have in Hopeland, near Chinchilla, is the biggest pollution event probably in Queensland’s history,” Dr Miles said.
“It’s certainly the biggest pollution investigation and prosecution in Queensland’s history.”
State parliament last week passed new laws that will force resource companies to clean up their messes, even in the event of administration.
Late last week, Linc Energy’s chief executive and managing director Craig Ricato resigned from his positions, along with the chief operating and chief financial officers.
All three have said they will work with administrators PPB Advisory on a contractual basis.