The Greens have also,in effect,had their allocation reduced,being given the same number of staff despite their party room increasing from nine to 16 MPs.
Albanese said he did not buy the argument that independents and minor party MPs had to do more work than government or opposition representatives.
“This is a very recent phenomenon of an upping of parliamentary staff,” he told ABC radio.
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“What concerns me is that[under] the Morrison government – at the same time as they were cutting Centrelink staff,people can’t get passports,visas can’t get processed – the only area of public service that saw an increase in staffing levels appears to have been parliamentary staff.”
Crossbench senators Jacqui Lambie,independent David Pocock and One Nation’s Pauline Hanson have saidthey will not support government legislation they have not had time to properly understand because of a lack of staff. Their votes are crucial because the government will need backing from the Greens plus one crossbencher to pass legislation the Coalition opposes.
Albanese’s response is that he intends to increase resources in the parliamentary library,which helps all MPs and also produces bill digests explaining every piece of legislation.