First Nickel receivership: Sudbury workers won't be paid severance

Miners from the now-closed Lockerby Mine in Sudbury will not get severance pay for their years of work.

Unionized employees found out Thursday that severance isn't a priority now that First Nickelis in receivership.

Claude Brabant, a hoist man at Lockerby, said he wasn't surprised at the closure.

"The writing was on the wall there, you could see it was coming ... but I didn't think it would be this fast," he said.

Workers who showed up Thursday morning at Lockerby were met by locked gates.

By noon, a court had approved a receiver to take over from the owner First Nickel.

In the afternoon, workers gathered at a Sudbury hotel to get some answers to their questions.

The vice-president of Sudbury operations, Vern Baker, said management had a day-and-a-half notice of the closure to prepare pay stubs.

He said all employees will be paid their wages and vacation days in full but there won't be any severance for workers.

'I'm used to it'

While there were moments of tension during the meeting, overall, the miners met the news with black humour.

Lay-offs aren't unusual in the industry, miner Tom Gorval said. He worked at Lockerby for 11 years.

"I think this is the third time, third or fourth time, I've been at Lockerby that it closed down. So I'm used to it. I'm an old vet."

Miners can apply for some government money to cover the unpaid severance but some, like Gorval, stand to lose thousands of dollars.He's planning toapply to a government program for some relief.

The workers were told their pensions are safe because the company doesn't have oversight of those.

Gorval seemed resigned to the news.

"Well the price of ore is down ... everyone's feeling the effect of it," he said.

"It's the larger companies that can carry themselves through the bad times. It's the small companies that take the toll."

First Nickel owed more than $30 million when it went into receivership Thursday.