Russell Island fire: Annastacia Palaszczuk sparks debate over special boat trip to scene of tragedy in which five children and one adult died

Annastacia Palaszczuk has sparked a fierce debate after she hitched a ride on a special police boat to visit an island where a father and his five sons died in a fire.

The Queensland leader, dubbed the “part-time prime minister” by her critics, was photographed walking from a police patrol boat to the jetty on Russell Island during lunch on Tuesday.

Ms Palaszczuk and her entourage paid their respects at the scene of Sunday morning’s tragedy, where 34-year-old Wayne Bobinet and his boys, aged between four and 11, lived.

But locals on the island wondered why she was piggybacking on the police when she could have taken the public passenger ferry, which runs about every half hour.

An irate resident commented on Facebook that Ms. Palaszczuk “can’t even handle the public to cross the ferry.”

Another asked, “Did it cost the taxpayer to get her on the police boat?”

One person claimed that the ‘Prime Minister’s SUV arrived at the police vessel 20 minutes before she arrived with two police boats’.

But some defended the Prime Minister’s actions.

“People wouldn’t have left her alone (on the ferry),” one wrote.

“You can bet there’s some idiot screaming and ranting.”

A spokesman for the Prime Minister defended her travel arrangements as “appropriate.”

The Police Commissioner accompanied the Prime Minister to Russell Island and made appropriate travel arrangements.

The Commissioner accompanied the Prime Minister as she paid a floral tribute and paid her respects on behalf of all Queensland residents following the tragic deaths of five young children and their father.

“The Commissioner also accompanied the Prime Minister as she visited the local school, met with first responders and met with local residents to make it clear that the community has Queensland’s full support.”

On Tuesday afternoon, Ms. Palaszczuk shared photos of her visit, where she laid out a bouquet of flowers and signed a condolence book on the spot.

“The lives lost in the Russell Island house fire are a devastating tragedy,” she wrote on Twitter.

“It has deeply affected this close-knit community. All Queenslanders feel their grief.

“Today on Russell Island we paid our respects to those who lost their lives.”

Ms Palaszczuk said she would be ‘there to support this community in any way she can’.

Queensland opposition leader David Crisafulli visited the island the day before on Monday.

“Between the pain, the people of Queensland are already proving how big our hearts can be,” he wrote on Facebook.

“Volunteers told me they just want to be here in case people need someone to listen to them.

“When faced with an immeasurable tragedy, the little things can make a big difference and the big hearts of the people of Queensland are already shining through these dark days.”

It is clear that Mr. Crisafulli and his team took the ferry and were then offered a lift to the scene of the tragedy.

The fire claimed the lives of Wayne Godinet, 34, his twins Kyza and Koa, aged four, his three-year-old son Nicky, and his stepsons, Zack, 11, and Harry, 10.

The children’s mother, Samantha Stephenson, 28, and her 21-year-old sister managed to escape the burning tenement and were released from hospital on Monday.

Mrs. Stephenson’s boyfriend, who has a Go fund me campaign to help pay for the six funerals told Daily Mail Australia: “Samantha just wants the world to know — check your smoke alarms and hold your babies.”

The police boat that Mrs. Palaszczuk traveled on was called the Sondra Lena.

It is named after Officer Sondra Lena who died on duty in April 1992 when she was hit by a car while operating a roadblock to locate an inmate who had escaped from the Capricornia Correctional Center.