A Labor leader has played down allegations that he wasted taxpayer funds by taking his own private jet to a climate announcement instead of traveling with Anthony Albanese.
Chris Bowen and the Prime Minister were under pressure to confess after an eagle-eyed local revealed two Royal Australian Air Force planes waiting on the tarmac at Scone Airport.
Both men were in the Hunter region on Thursday last week to visit the site of the former Liddell coal-fired power station, spending money on grants and subsidies to ensure more solar panels are built in Australia.
But after the Coalition called the photograph evidence of a “scandal” on Monday, Bowen faced the media at his constituency office in Sydney.
Energy Minister Chris Bowen has played down a private flight ‘scandal’ after he chose to fly alone for a climate announcement rather than fly with Anthony Albanese (both pictured).
He argued that the reason he could not travel with the Prime Minister was simple: the runway could not accommodate a larger plane that Albanese would normally take.
“The Prime Minister always travels with the Royal Australian Air Force… that’s for security reasons and it’s quite appropriate,” Mr Bowen said.
“The runway at Scone was not strong enough to support the large aircraft, so the Air Force recommended and made the decision to use two small aircraft.”
Bowen said the number of staff accompanying the couple on the trip also had to be reduced due to weight restrictions.
Albanese and Bowen traveled to Muswellbrook and announced the $1 billion solar panel programme, Sun Shot, alongside local MP Dan Repacholi and fellow leader Pat Conroy.
The bosses of AGL and Sun Drive, who had just signed an early agreement to build a photovoltaic solar panel manufacturing plant on the former Liddell site.
Both planes arrived in the region from Canberra. According to 2GB, one of the planes remained on the runway for approximately three hours.
The other remained in the place for just an hour and a half.
An eagle-eyed local revealed two Royal Australian Air Force planes waiting on the tarmac at Scone Airport on Thursday, sparking the saga (pictured).
It is not unusual for ministers to use taxpayer-funded Royal Australian Air Force planes to travel around the country and make announcements.
When asked about the photo, a spokeswoman for the Prime Minister’s office stopped short of offering a reason why the couple couldn’t take the same plane.
“The Prime Minister and Ministers were excited to be back in the Hunter region to make a billion-dollar announcement that brings us one step closer to ensuring the regions that have always driven Australia forward are not left behind,” said.
But Housing Coalition spokesman Michael Sukkar said the photo, posted on a local community Facebook page, was “quite damning”.
“It’s a scandal no matter how you look at it,” he told 2GB, who was the first to break the story.
‘Here we have a situation where clearly the Prime Minister and his minister are using taxpayers’ money to live the good life flying in private planes.
‘Now the Prime Minister has the right to use a private jet. And what would normally happen is that a minister, if he was traveling with the Prime Minister and made the same announcement or visited the same place, he would hitchhike with the Prime Minister.
“But taking a backseat to itself is something I think is remarkable: it’s a grotesque use of taxpayers’ money, at a time when… (people) are struggling to fill their baskets at the supermarket.”
