Jo Haylen has quit as the New South Wales transport minister following revelations about her use of a ministerial car for private purposes.
It emerged on the weekend that Jo Haylen had asked her chauffeur to take her and some friends to a winery lunch on the Australia Day weekend. It involved a 13-hour 446km round-trip for the driver, from Sydney to Haylen’s holiday house at Caves Beach and then a Hunter Valley winery and back.
“I have made mistakes, people aren’t perfect,” Haylen said on Tuesday as she read out her resignation statement. She did not take questions.
“I did not break the rules, but I acknowledge that’s not the only test here. I’ve let the public down and I’m very sorry for that. We were elected to be better than the last government.”
It was reported on Monday that Haylen had also used a taxpayer-funded driver to ferry herself and her children from Caves Beach – about 100km north of Sydney – to the city for weekend sporting events.
Ministerial cars and drivers can be used for private purposes under the current rules in NSW. But Haylen admitted on the weekend the Hunter Valley winery lunch failed the “pub test”.
The premier, Chris Minns, on Tuesday was asked about potential further revelations. News Corp Australia reported the transport minister allegedly used a ministerial car to take her family west of the Blue Mountains for a lunch.
The outgoing minister admitted at her snap press conference she had also taken another trip to the Hunter Valley with her husband using a ministerial car in 2024.
“I was working on that day, but I acknowledge that the use of my personal driver was an error of judgment by me,” Haylen said.
“My mistakes are now causing my government damage. Politics is tough. Expectations are very high. I know that. I’ve let the public down and I’m very sorry about that.”
Earlier on Tuesday, Minns said ministers were often tasked with weekend work and Haylen had said she was dropping her children at sporting events en route to work in Sydney.
“[The driver] drove her from Caves Beach to Sydney to go to work and, on the way to work, the child was dropped at sport,” the premier said, adding ministers sometimes worked up to 70 hours a week.
“In other words, the trip wasn’t so the kids could go to the sport on the weekends, the trip was so that she’d get to work.”
Minns said he asked Haylen about the Blue Mountains trip and “Jo insisted that was work-related, that was her chief-of-staff’s house, and she was working on the weekend”.
But the premier also noted: “I can’t defend the indefensible – particularly for the Australia Day [weekend] event. You have got to treat taxpayer money as if it’s your own.”
Haylen on Tuesday spoke about the demands of being a minister and a mother.
“You don’t switch on and off from being a minister. You don’t switch off being a mum either. Combining the two can be difficult but I’m far from alone when it comes to that daily challenge.
“I’ve always prided myself on trusting in people and in the goodwill of the public I’m lucky to serve. Treating people with respect and acting with integrity. And that I am loyal and always will be. It kills me right now that people might think otherwise.”
Minns has vowed to tighten the rules governing ministerial drivers to prevent the types of journeys that Haylen took.
“We are changing the rules in NSW to ensure that it’s used for official business purposes,” he said on Tuesday. “If it’s private use, it’s only for incidental or minor parts of a minister’s job.”
Haylen had been battling a long-running industrial dispute with railway workers that repeatedly threatened to shut down the state’s train network.
She previously came under fire for hiring former Labor staffer Josh Murray to lead the transport department and the apparent use of a public servant in her office for political work.
Late on Monday, she was removed from the lineup of a key planning summit set to be held in Sydney on Tuesday.
Haylen on Sunday promised to pay back the $750 cost of the trip to Brokenwood Wines in Pokolbin on 25 January.
Source link