The shell game Ken Buchanan is playing has to stop.
The former forest industry magnate was forced to seek bankruptcy protection on two of his idled mills last week; two more, Atkokan Forest Products and Northern?Sawmills, were placed in the hands of a receiver.
The numbers are discouraging, but not because of the amount. It’s the pecking order.
The workers – owed $6.1 million in severance pay at Northern Sawmills – stand to see little or nothing of that money as unsecured creditors.
Lucky Star Holdings, however, another company owned by Buchanan, tops the list of secured creditors, owed $23.5 million. Buchanan Sales Inc. is owed an unknown amount, rounding out a list of creditors that includes G.E. Canada Equipment Financing G.P., RBC and the Workers Safety Insurance Board.
Workers, one owed as much as $107,000, will be hard pressed to collect a dime.
Protection for them must be put in place, so when situations like this arise, they get their fair share.
For every dollar Lucky Star Holdings and other secured creditors get, workers should get equal payment, until the workers have their due.
Otherwise we could be looking at the exact same scenario decades down the road, if and when the mining industry starts to lose its lustre.
The former forest industry magnate was forced to seek bankruptcy protection on two of his idled mills last week; two more, Atkokan Forest Products and Northern?Sawmills, were placed in the hands of a receiver.
The numbers are discouraging, but not because of the amount. It’s the pecking order.
The workers – owed $6.1 million in severance pay at Northern Sawmills – stand to see little or nothing of that money as unsecured creditors.
Lucky Star Holdings, however, another company owned by Buchanan, tops the list of secured creditors, owed $23.5 million. Buchanan Sales Inc. is owed an unknown amount, rounding out a list of creditors that includes G.E. Canada Equipment Financing G.P., RBC and the Workers Safety Insurance Board.
Workers, one owed as much as $107,000, will be hard pressed to collect a dime.
Protection for them must be put in place, so when situations like this arise, they get their fair share.
For every dollar Lucky Star Holdings and other secured creditors get, workers should get equal payment, until the workers have their due.
Otherwise we could be looking at the exact same scenario decades down the road, if and when the mining industry starts to lose its lustre.
