Labor MP resigns portfolio after revelations into her use of taxpayer-funded ministerial car for private purposes and criticism from premier Chris Minns. 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 told reporters on Tuesday. “I did not break the rules, but I acknowledge that 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.

“I’ve let the public down and I’m very sorry about that,” Haylen said when stating she had told Minns she would resign as transport minister. The outgoing minister admitted 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 judgement by me,” Haylen said.

“My mistakes are now causing my government damage. Politics is tough. Expectations are very high. I know 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 had 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.”.