Four months after he was elected Australia's Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd's halo has slipped, amid allegations he and his ministers accepted free travel from a Chinese businessman while in opposition.
Ian Tang, whose company paid for 16 overseas trips by Mr Rudd and other Labor politicians, has links with a gambling magnate, Stanley Ho, who ran casinos in Macau, now part of China, for more than 30 years. Mr Rudd, a devout Christian, recently declared his intention to address the entrenched issue of problem gambling in Australia, and said he "hated" poker machines, observing: "I know something of their impact on families."
But revelations that he helped launch a showpiece retail development in Beijing backed by Mr Tang and Mr Ho in mid-2006 have brought accusations of hypocrisy and poor judgement from his opponents.
Mr Rudd has admitted that he and other Labor politicians, including Wayne Swan, the Treasurer, accepted trips paid for by Mr Tang's company, Beijing AustChina Technology, between 2005 and last November's general election. The company also donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to the Labor Party, as well as to its conservative rival, the Nationals.
The conservative opposition said the public was left wondering what Mr Tang expected to gain by cultivating the man who seemed destined to become Prime Minister. "Was that meant to open doors for them when they got into government?" asked one Liberal MP, Don Randall.
Mr Rudd, a former foreign affairs and trade spokesman, rejected suggestions that the free travel had left him indebted to Mr Tang, or vulnerable to "influence peddling". He said opposition politicians in Australia received no taxpayer funding for overseas trips, and it was common practice for them to rely on other sources.
"It's just a reality," he told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. "If you are trying to do these jobs from opposition, then you are relying upon private sponsorships, whether it's by companies with interests in the resources sector, the commercial sector, the financial services sector or wherever, to make sure that that travel is possible."
Mr Rudd said he had declared the trips at the time, and the party had declared the donations. "The key thing is transparency and declaration," he claimed.
The Prime Minister, a former diplomat and fluent Mandarin speaker, was flown to Beijing by Mr Tang for the launch of the £590m Friendship Store. He also visited the US, Britain and Sudan during the same trip, at Mr Tang's expense.
Mr Rudd declared himself willing to consider some public funding for overseas travel for opposition politicians, to reduce their reliance on private companies.
Beijing AustChina Technology, which imports Australian telecommunications products, said no strings had been attached to the free trips. They were merely designed to foster politicians' interest in China, a spokesman said, and no company representatives travelled with them.
"AustChina supported members of parliament to travel overseas in the last parliament to encourage their interest in China and to promote opportunities for Australian exporters to access Chinese markets," the spokesman said.
The attempt to embarrass the government partly backfired, with Mr Rudd – on being challenged to explain the nature of the company's business – producing letters demonstrating close links between AustChina and senior ministers in the last government. "I would suggest here that we have a modest case of double standards," he said.
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