GOLD COAST BULLETIN

Thursday February 25, 2010

GOLD Coast insulation inspector Tony McCormack wondered how he was going to feed his family. He was one of 15 workers at Allpro Insulation at Molendinar who lost their jobs because of the failed Home Insulation Program which was scrapped by federal Environment Minister Peter Garrett, without notice. The lay-offs at Allpro were just the tip of the iceberg. Insulation industry representatives said hundreds of jobs on the Gold Coast had been, or would be, lost – not just installers but secretaries, sales people, truck drivers and other auxiliary staff. Mr Garrett announced a revised scheme would be introduced on June 1 2010, but insulation installers said that would cause as many problems as it would solve, as customers would put off installing insulation for three months. After giving 90 per cent of his staff two weeks’ notice on, Allpro Insulation boss Tony Harvey said he would have kept them all on if the federal government had handled the installation scheme better, or relaunched the scheme sooner. Mr Harvey said he had to make 15 staff redundant, leaving just himself and his wife to run the business until at least June. ‘‘There’s nothing to do,’’ he said. ‘‘There’s no business until June. For three months there will be no business. “We’ve got $500,000 worth of stock that’s useless.’’ Mr Harvey said he was losing all his skilled workers. Mr McCormack said while Mr Harvey had done the right thing by him, it was Mr Garrett who had left him without a job.