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The wheels haven’t even lifted off the tarmac yet but the addition of the colour blue to the new paint job of Stephen Harper’s government jet is stirring controversy in Ottawa.

The prime minister’s plane, a CC-150 Polaris (Airbus A-310), recently underwent maintenance, which happens every six years. This time though, that maintenance included a $50,000 taxpayer-funded white, red and blue redesign of the plane’s once grey exterior.

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“I wonder how it feels for grassroots Conservative MPs to be forced to defend using tax dollars to play ‘pimp my ride’ with the prime minister’s flying Taj Mahal,” the NDP’s chief attack dog Pat Martin said in question period Friday.

“I wonder if they used the PMO’s slush fund to rebrand ‘air force run’ in Conservative party colours,” the Manitoba MP added.

Deepak Obhrai, parliamentary secretary to the minister of foreign affairs, said he didn’t understand the NDP’s opposition to doing “anything good for Canada.”