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Another restaurant closes doors as Ocean Palace workers seek help to claim their pay

Executives of Ocean Palace Restaurant and Nightclub offered last night to make a last-ditch effort to find the cash for severance pay owed to 230 workers.

The news came as another restaurant went out of business yesterday, leaving about 40 workers without a job.

Twenty-one workers from the Kam Yuet Seafood restaurant in Tuen Mun have registered with the Labour Department for help in getting backpay and money owed for not giving them seven days' notice. The department was trying to contact the owners to arrange for a conciliation meeting on Monday.

At Tsim Sha Tsui's Ocean Palace, minority shareholder Cheung Yiu-wing and executives Sunny Cheung Wing-sun and Chiu Chi-fai met legislator Lee Cheuk-yan to discuss severance payment arrangements for the workers.

Mr Lee, who is general secretary of the Hong Kong Confederation of Trade Unions, said after the meeting the executives would report back by 8pm tonight with detailed plans on how to settle payments.

He estimated that workers were owed about $9.1 million in severance pay, of which $3.4 million is covered under the mandatory provident fund.

The insolvency fund could pay employees $4.3 million of the remaining $5.7 million, but not the full amount, Mr Lee said.

'The staff would only accept a plan which is better than applying for the insolvency fund,' he said.

Mr Cheung Yiu-wing appeared agitated when bombarded with questions after the meeting on whether he would commit to finding the funds to cover severances.

'This is not even my company. You have to make that clear,' he told reporters after the meeting last night. 'I am volunteering to do this for the workers. I volunteered to come here for the meeting.'

Executive Chiu Chi-fai locked himself in the toilet for half an hour after workers chased him.

A Labour Department spokeswoman said 212 of the workers registered for help in getting their severance payments yesterday, a day after the restaurant closed.

Mr Cheung Yiu-wing told Mr Lee in a meeting on Sunday he would use $300,000 of the $800,000 rental deposit to pay money owed to workers for annual leave.

The department is considering requiring restaurateurs to set aside an amount of guaranteed funding when starting a business to ensure they have money for severances, a spokeswoman said.

The insolvency fund has started compiling a list of people whose businesses often have to seek help from the fund. Its chairman, Ho Sai-chu, said the fund had a surplus of about $80 million and would be able to pay the Palace workers.



Eatery vows to dig deeper for cash