Federal MPs thought $250,000 of watches given as gifts were fakes

A trio of high-ranking Liberal MPs have said the only reason they kept $250,000 worth of extravagant watches gifted by a Chinese businessman was because they thought the items were counterfeit.

Former Prime Minister Tony Abbott, Stuart Robert and Ian MacFarlane were at a dinner at Parliament House in 2013 when a representative from Liguancheng group, believed to be billionaire Li Ruipeng, presented the gifts.

The watches were pulled out of a plastic bag and handed to the then-Opposition MPs, with Mr Robert and Mr Abbott receiving two watches each– one for themselves and one to give to their wives.

Mr Macfarlane declared the watch as a gift, believing fake Rolexes to be worth about $300-$500.

After a run-in with by WA MP Ian Goodenough, who owned a genuine Rolex, Mr MacFarlane had the watch appraised and found it to be worth nearly $40,000.

All three MPs returned the watches to the Liguancheng group after finding out they were not rip-offs.

“There was no way in hell I’d keep a watch worth that,’’ Mr Macfarlane told the Herald Sun.

The luxury watches incident have further stoked the coals of under-fire Human Services Minister Stuart Robert, who was grilled by Labor MPs yesterday for his trip to Beijing in 2014.

Mr Robert claimed the trip was for private reasons despite meeting with a senior Chinese minister.

"He's got to now make a full statement as to what it was that he was doing in Beijing," Shadow attorney-general Mark Dreyfus said.

"It can't be both a trip for private purposes and a trip on which he met with a minister in the Chinese Government."