"Only Rishi Sunak could travel from an event to meet "ordinary voters" by private jet."
Rishi Sunak had a taxpayer-funded RAF jet take him back from a GB News show appearance to supposedly meet ordinary voters, it has been revealed.
Sunak has been slammed after the Mirror exposed he made the trip by jet, which could have taken just 2.5 hours by train from Darlington to London from an event in County Durham hosted by GB News.
The Prime Minister has become notorious for taking private jets for short distance journeys around the UK and racking up expensive publicly funded trips by private jet.
Commentators were quick to point out the dissonance of taking a taxpayer-funded jet from an event where Sunak had hoped to connect with ordinary people. Sunak appeared at the GB News “People’s Forum” for an hour-long Q&A on Monday evening, in which he animatedly defended private schools as he supposedly met with ordinary voters.
He faced criticism last year when official government documents showed his publicly funded air travel had amounted to £500,000 in just over a fortnight.
Other examples include taking a helicopter on a 100 mile trip from London to Norwich and back to meet residents on a housing development, and using an RAF helicopter from London to Dover – a journey which takes just over an hour by train.
Not hugely productive when trying to convince the population you’re not out of touch and do in fact care about green policy.
Matt Edwards, Green Party councillor responded: “Only Rishi Sunak could travel from an event to meet “ordinary voters” by Private Jet.
“But this isn’t any ordinary private jet, it’s a tax payer funded RAF jet. Meanwhile millions are struggling because of the Cost of Living Crisis caused by a decade of Tory government.”
One X user wrote: “An extremely wealthy man using a publicly funded RAF jet as a free taxi service so he can appear on GB News. The Tories are utterly bereft of any kind of moral sense.”
Another X user said: “Nothing says ‘man of the people’ like trying to connect with carefully chosen Tory voters, failing miserably, then flying home by RAF jet.”
Hannah Davenport is news reporter at Left Foot Forward, focusing on trade unions and environmental issues
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