Payman faces Senate criticism over staff request and attack remark
Independent senator Fatima Payman drew criticism in the Senate after asking whether Prime Minister Anthony Albanese was waiting for an attack on her or her office before approving her request for extra staff. She was questioning Special Minister of State Don Farrell about a bid she says has gone unresolved for almost two years, and suggested she might be treated differently because she left the Labor Party.
Payman says her staff are struggling to manage work comparable to that of a larger office, and accused Albanese of delaying the decision out of pettiness. Farrell called her reference to an attack on fellow MP Helen Haines outrageous and said he would raise the staffing request with the Prime Minister again; committee chair Karen Grogan also challenged Payman and urged her to withdraw the remark. The exchange came amid reported threats against Payman, including more than 100 incidents her office says it referred to Australian Federal Police.
In short
- Payman questioned whether an attack would prompt action on her staffing request.
- She says she has sought two extra advisers for almost two years.
- Farrell said he would raise the request with Albanese again.
Steelman: both sides, in good faith
The strongest fair case each way — we don't pick a winner.
The case for
Payman’s strongest case is that a long-unresolved request for staff deserves a clear, timely decision, especially if her office is handling a workload comparable to larger offices. She may reasonably question whether leaving Labor has affected the response, and her reference to threats could be read as highlighting the seriousness of her staff’s safety concerns rather than predicting an attack.
The case against
Farrell and Grogan’s strongest case is that invoking an attack on a fellow MP in a staffing dispute risks sounding like an accusation that the Prime Minister is indifferent to political violence. Even if Payman intended to stress the threats her office faces, they could reasonably argue that the remark was inflammatory and distracted from the merits of her request, which should be assessed through ordinary staffing processes.
Explained simply
Fatima Payman is an independent senator in Australia’s federal Parliament. She was elected for the Labor Party but left it in 2024, and now sits outside the government and opposition parties.
Senators can question ministers about government decisions, including how parliamentary offices are staffed. Payman says her office has too few staff for its workload and that her request for more has been pending for nearly two years; Don Farrell is the minister responsible for these matters.
The exchange also referred to Helen Haines, another independent MP, whose office has faced a security incident. Payman’s office has reported threats to police, making security part of the wider discussion about the support provided to parliamentarians.
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Originally published by Daily Mail as “Fatima Payman sparks fury with ‘outrageous’ question about whether Albo is waiting for her to suffer a Helen Haines-style attack before giving her extra staff”.