Photo: RNZ / Samuel Rillstone
Opposition leader Christopher Luxon says he will not use Defence Force planes to travel internationally if elected as prime minister.
He says the Defence Force's 757s are well past their use-by date, and Prime Minister Chris Hipkins' delegation to China should have flown commercial.
The criticism follows news the Defence Force was providing a second plane as a backup in case the one sent to China broke down. The second flight travelled to the Philippines before returning to Australia.
"What I'd say is it's very obvious that they are unreliable in spite of the great work of our air force who manage to keep them well maintained and safe, but the second thing is they are unreliable," Luxon told reporters on Tuesday morning.
"We are in a recession that this government created and it would be inappropriate for us to actually commit and spend new money on planes in a recession, and therefore my personal view is we travel commercial.
"What I'd say to you, there's a whole bunch of options - you know, commercial travel; charter travel - there's a whole range of other options available to the New Zealand government."
He was asked whether that meant he was committing to flying commercial for international travel if National won the election.
"That's what I'm saying," he said. "We're in the middle of a recession, I wish you'd probably pay a little bit more attention to what has happened in the last week."
Hipkins' trip to China includes the travel to Beijing, to Tianjin, back to Beijing and a stop in Shanghai before returning to New Zealand. A spokesperson said the Air Force planes were far cheaper to use than a commercial charter - and had other benefits such as security.
Luxon argued flying the more than 80 people - MPs, staff, about 30 business leaders, and journalists - on chartered or commercial flights would be cheaper than maintaining the planes.
"[That's] not more expensive [than] maintaining the current aircraft that we've got. You know, we're spending tens of millions of dollars - almost $100m has been spent on maintenance versus doing a charter operation or something else, for the four or five times a prime minister goes overseas."
Acting Prime Minister Carmel Sepuloni said flying commercially to China would have been more expensive.
"It certainly would have been more expensive if we'd gone commercial, and there's a long history of leaders taking delegations including business delegations on these trips going back to the 1990s, so it would be out of step to change that.
"Not fiscally prudent, and also just out of step with what leaders have done in the past - mind you, you'd have to be a leader to make that choice. He [Luxon] may not get that opportunity."
The $100m includes more than $70m spent between October 2017 and July last year for the NZDF's two 757s, and a further $33m since.
The aircraft are also used for operations including transporting troops and supplies, training pilots, and should be flown regularly as part of maintenance, as long-term groundings can affect their airworthiness. They are now about 30 years old, but not due to be replaced in 2028-2030.
Luxon rejected suggestions that a Defence Force flight allowed greater flexibility.
"There's other options, there's charter options for example, there's commercial arrangements, there's other ways in which you can manage that within a visit. All I'm just saying to you is these are ancient aircraft, they shouldn't be flying, they're well past their use-by date."
He said he had been on trade delegations in the past and never travelled on the 757 if possible, "because I can go direct flight in a much quicker way".
Replacing the planes would not be a priority for a National government however, he said.
"We are now in a recession and this will not be a priority in my government, so the reality is whether you like it or not, we travel commercial, we charter aircraft, we do a whole bunch of other arrangements that are possible to be able to do that," Luxon said.
He said he supported Hipkins' trip, however.
"Foreign policy, particularly with respect to China, we've got a long-standing relationship of over 50 years that's characterised by mutual respect, consistently collaborating on areas that we can work together, but also raising our respective concerns. So I'm expecting it to be a very constructive meeting, very supportive of the prime minister being there, I think it's important that he is there representing New Zealand."