The Courier-Mail is reporting that the CEO (pictured above) is suing the Presbyterian Church-owned aged care provider for $2.36 million in lost wages and damages after he was stood down in February, two years into a five-and-a-half-year contract.
In his statement of claim in the Supreme Court of Queensland, Mr Skelton said he was paid a $500,000 annual salary package that included a $430,000 salary, the use of two cars worth $35,000, a $10,000 education allowance, superannuation payments and a $7,000 “health and wellbeing’’ allowance.
He said PresCare sacked him without reason, paid him $165,384 in lieu of notice and ordered him to leave the building at a late-night meeting on February 20 at its head office in Milton, 2km west of the Brisbane CBD.
Mr Skelton alleges that PresCare knew that by terminating his contract, he would suffer financial loss and damage, stress, and emotional or psychological pain and suffering as well as “a loss, or damage to his reputation’’ among church ministers and “elders’’.
He added that PresCare’s action was “nonsensical, harsh and unreasonable’’ as he had “never received any negative comments or concerns about his performance or conduct’’.
Mr Skelton was appointed CEO of PresCare in 2013, after working as its chief financial officer for 11 years.
The newspaper also said that the Department of Health had confirmed that PresCare is seeking extra taxpayer funding through the Government’s $850 million COVID-19 aged care stimulus program.
As we reported in The Daily RESOURCE on 28 May, PresCare is no longer planning to operate its $43 million WRB by PresCare aged care home that it had partnered with Justin Laboo’s Catalyst REIT at Corinda, 9km west of the Brisbane CBD.
PresCare’s new CEO, Wayne Knapp (pictured right) – who was the Chairman of PresCare from 2000 to 2014 and resigned from a recent reappointment to the Board to take up the role – told the paper he could not comment on Mr Skelton’s departure as the matter was before the courts.
However, he stated the “mobility aid supply arms and related non-core operations are likely to be sold as they are not core to PresCare’s provision of residential aged care’’.
