On Monday, Prime Minister Scott Morrison headed to Mudgee to speak to people on the frontlines of the bushfire emergency. If he was hoping for the warmest of welcomes, he may have been disappointed.
While meeting people at an evacuation centre, Mr Morrison was introduced to an RFS volunteer named Jacqui.
In footage broadcast by The Project, Jacqui can be seen shaking Mr Morrison's hand, while a man in a green shirt tells her "Jacqui, this is the Prime Minister."
"He's not my Prime Minister," Jacqui responds, still shaking Scott Morrison's hand.
The footage has since attracted widespread attention on social media. On Tuesday morning, the top five trending topics in Australia were all criticisms of Scott Morrison, with thousands interpreting Jacqui's remark as another critique of the PM.
Scott Morrison has faced intense backlash after it emerged that he was on holiday in Hawaii last week while Australians faced an escalating bushfire emergency.
The Prime Minister has been criticised for his absence during the bushfire emergency, as well as his refusal to consider changes to his government's climate policy in response to the crisis.
While the video of Jacqui has been shared widely by Australians frustrated with Morrison's leadership, Mr Morrison said that Jacqui's comments were simply a joke.
"As Jacqui joked with me yesterday, I'm not her PM, because she's British, Boris Johnson is," Mr Morrison tweeted this morning.
Associated Press footage of a later point in the conversation appears to show Jacqui telling Morrison "I've been here fifteen years."
The Feed reached out to Jacqui for comment, but she was unavailable to speak to us as she was busy fighting fires.
RFS Inspector Troy Gersback, who oversees Jacqui's unit, confirmed that Jacqui is indeed a UK citizen, and that she made the comment to Scott Morrison in jest.
