In a statement, the City of Paris defended the trip to New Caledonia and French Polynesia by Mayor Anne Hidalgo, who has been criticized by the right-wing opposition for the carbon footprint and cost of the journey. Here’s a summary of the matter.
The official trip of Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo to French Polynesia, presented as “official” by her entourage and preceding her vacation, has drawn the ire of her right-wing opposition, who mock her carbon footprint and her “travel at the expense of Parisians”. The mayor’s trip to French Polynesia was justified by a visit to the Olympic site Teahupoo in Tahiti, where the surfing event will take place. The visit to these facilities was supposed to take place on Saturday, October 21.
The trip of the socialist mayor, accompanied by her sports deputies Pierre Rabadan and Jacques Martial, took place from October 16 to 22, according to the agenda subsequently provided by the City, which had not previously officially communicated about this subject.
On Tuesday, October 31, the opposition group LR and affiliated parties in the Paris City Council reminded everyone of the “20 trips around the world” made by the mayor, officially, since her re-election in 2020, which, according to them, equates to a carbon footprint of “51 tons of CO2”. The opposition mocked the “Hidalgo carbon tour” while the capital’s elected official gave “ecological lessons without the slightest scruples”.
On Monday evening, the city justified this trip, explaining that its purpose was to work on three issues: the White Night, a cultural event that will be dedicated to the overseas territories in 2024; the climate emergency, with Anne Hidalgo “proposing to the mayors of New Caledonia and French Polynesia to join the delegation of the International Association of Francophone Mayors (AIMF), which she will lead as president during COP 28 in Dubai.”
The last part of this official trip, originally scheduled for Saturday, October 21 but postponed to the following day, was the inspection of the infrastructure for the Olympic surfing event in Tahiti. But unlike what was planned, Anne Hidalgo did not personally go to the Olympic site, instead, she was represented by Pierre Rabadan, the city admitted on Monday. “At the request of the President of French Polynesia (Moetai Brotherson), the Mayor of Paris did not go to the site on Saturday due to local tensions related to the construction of a judge’s tower. A meeting on-site was planned for the same day by the Polynesian presidency,” according to the statement. This absence is fueling criticism from the right-wing opposition in Paris. “Everything proves that this trip to the South Pacific is an alibi trip,” denounced David Alphand, vice-president of the Changer Paris group, in the newspaper Le Parisien.
At the end of her trip, which ended on October 21 according to her entourage, Anne Hidalgo was “on vacation,” according to the same source, which indicates that she was scheduled to return to City Hall on Monday, November 6. Former RN deputy Gilbert Collard ridiculed it as “olympic vacations”. According to the latest statement from the city, “the Mayor of Paris extended her official trip with private time fully paid for by herself,” and she returned on Sunday, November 5, paying for her own return ticket. The transportation expenses of the Paris delegation, consisting of six people (three elected officials and three staff), amounted to 40,955 euros, and the accommodation and meal expenses were 18,545 euros, “in accordance with the practices in force in the three territorial public services,” according to the City. Anne Hidalgo announced that she had submitted a request in advance to the Ethics Commission for an opinion on this trip. This opinion will be made public, as stated in the statement from the City of Paris released on Monday evening.
