They travelled more than 4000km to start a dream new life.
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Before Christmas, Hamish and Hazel Griffin, with their son Freddie, finished up in the rural Queensland town of Cloncurry.
The manager of the Cloncurry Discovery Park, Hamish Griffin said they were moving on after eight years to manage the Big 4 Tourist Retreat resort in Strahan on the west coast of Tasmania. Hamish was to be the park's manager, and Hazel, his assistant.
But, after selling all their furniture in outback Queensland and travelling 4000 kilometres by car and ferry to the Apple Isle, things went wrong - quickly.
Mr Griffin said they started working on January 1 and he was promptly terminated for being overweight.
"The owner fooled me into going with him to move a sofa and then said that he didn't think I would be able to do it," Mr Griffin said.
"I asked why not and he said I was too fat and he said that he thought I couldn't climb a ladder, he thought I couldn't push a lawn mower, he thought I couldn't move a sofa.
"I asked him why he though this and he said 'well because of the way you look' I asked him where he was going with this and he said he couldn't employ me any longer."
Mr Griffin said he was dumbfounded and was not given the opportunity to show he could do the job.
"I was employed as the general manager, not a grounds and maintenance person," he said.
"I explained this and he said that he had offered us a lot of money and I would need to absorb the wages of a maintenance person and do both jobs.
"I said that he could not terminate me simply based on my appearance, but he said that it was not to do with how I look, but on my ability to do the job."
Mr Griffin said he did the same job in a larger property in extreme conditions in Queensland and worked in Afghanistan for three years as a contractor assisting NATO And ISAF forces where no-one had issues with him being overweight.
"He said that I had an obligation to tell him that I had a medical condition when he interviewed us, I said what medical condition and he said ... 'you are obese'," he said.
"The kicker is that I have actually lost 90kg in the last eight years through hard work and determination so to be told I'm too fat to be the manager of a tourist park was a kick in the guts."
The owner of Big 4 Tourist Retreat in Strahan, Paul Dutton confirmed to Australian Community Media he believed Mr Griffin had a duty to inform him of his condition prior to employment.
"I acted in a way that was reasonable and aligned with responsibility of care of health issues," Mr Dutton said.
"[Mr Griffin] knew he had a tough job on his hands, there are 11 acres and he had to do all the lawns.
"He could not attest that he could complete those tasks without health risks."
Mr Dutton said this was a very different job to the one Mr Griffin had in Cloncurry and was very hands on.
"There are 65 units here and you have to empty the gutters, and all the pallets of alcohol from the bottle shop need to be distributed," he said.
"It's unfortunate but he had a duty to declare his situation."
Mr Griffin is now examining his options and said it has cost them $12,000 to relocate and another $6000 to go back.
"I gave up a job and my wife's job, my son's school and music lessons, all our doctors, our friends, everything to move," he said.
Derek Barry
Editor of the North West Star Mount Isa since January 2016. Prior to that, an editor at several regional southern Queensland newspapers. Passionate about telling local stories. Comes with a strange accent to due an Irish accident of birth.
Editor of the North West Star Mount Isa since January 2016. Prior to that, an editor at several regional southern Queensland newspapers. Passionate about telling local stories. Comes with a strange accent to due an Irish accident of birth.
