Malcolm Turnbull has received a telescope worth $1,500 from Donald Trump as a diplomatic gift, new documents show.
According to a declaration of member’s interests published on Friday, the prime minister has also paid $891.23 back into the public purse so he can personally retain the telescope himself.
A spokesman for the prime minister’s office said the exchange occurred during Turnbull’s February trip to the US, at a meeting where Turnbull gifted Trump and his wife Melania with two pairs of new RM Williams boots, valued at $545 each.
Trump and Turnbull’s February meeting was their second face-to-face meeting since Trump’s election. Their relationship got off to a rocky start last year when Trump abruptly hung up on Turnbull 25 minutes into their first phone call over the US-Australian refugee resettlement deal.
Days before gifting Turnbull the telescope, Trump also announced he would cut funding to Nasa and shut down WFIRST, a new space telescope that was in development.
In previous meetings with world leaders, Trump has gifted Pope Francis a custom-bound collection of writings from Martin Luther King Jr. and gave Theresa May a framed picture of Abraham Lincoln’s second inauguration.
Don Whiteman, a manager at The Binocular and Telescope Shop in Sydney, said $1,500 would place Trump’s gift firmly on the cheap end of astronomical telescopes.
“It’s entry level. Or a bit over entry level.”
He added that Turnbull could have been given a spotting scope – used to watch whales or birds.
“They go to about $8,000 at the top end, at the bottom you could spend $250,” he said. “$1,500 is somewhere middle of the road.
“Malcolm Turnbull lives on Sydney Harbour. I would go with the idea that it is probably a decent spotting scope so he can look across the harbour, at sailing, at whales that come in. I don’t imagine he’s a guy who is going to get out the back of the PM’s residence in Canberra, looking up on a cold night with a beer.”
According to parliamentary guidelines, the allowable limit for a gift from a government source is $750. In order to retain a gift over this limit, a parliamentarian must pay the excess, plus GST.
Friday’s documents show that Turnbull paid $891.23 to the collector of public monies, which values the telescope at $1560.21.
Turnbull’s declaration comes among a raft of others made just before the Easter long weekend.
One Nation leader Pauline Hanson declared she had received free sponsored travel from Fortescue Mining Group to inspect mining sites in WA on 13 March.
The opposition leader, Bill Shorten, declared that he had received free accommodation upgrades at Crown Towers hotel in Perth and the Hilton Hotel in Sydney. His spouse Chloe also received free tickets to the Virgin Australia Melbourne Fashion Runway.
Queensland Labor senator Murray Watt received two tickets to the re-opening of the Queensland Home of the Arts art centre, including a performance from Tim Minchin.
Turnbull’s previous entry was to declare tickets he and his wife Lucy had received from St George bank to see the Oscar-winning film The Shape of Water.
