Greens senator Richard Di Natale has lost 16 staff in the 18 months since he became party leader, out of a total office complement of 23 people.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
But Dr Di Natale has characterised the comparatively high turnover as a matter of putting his own stamp on the office of leader and building his own team.
Staff who have headed to the exit include a communications director, two campaign advisers, a policy director and several more junior policy advisers and a personal assistant.
Leaders' offices are high-pressure environments that do see a regular turnover of staff, while the Department of Finance's pay-out arrangements are also particularly favourable for staff in the immediate aftermath of an election.
But in way of comparison, Tony Abbott lost 15 staff in an office of 53 in just less than his first two years as prime minister, while former prime minister Julia Gillard lost 14 staff out of 57 in just over a year.
Both paled in comparison to former prime minister Kevin Rudd, who turned over 60 per cent of his staff in just about two years.
The high turnover has prompted internal disquiet in the environmental party, with some blaming Dr Di Natale's chief of staff, Cate Faehrmann - a former NSW state MP - for being too "uncompromising" and her "desire to be a single-person gatekeeper" to the leader, according to sources familiar with the workings of the office.
Others in the party, however, say the exodus is a result of a change in strategic direction under Dr Di Natale, who has moved to broaden the party's electoral appeal and steer more of a middle course than his predecessor, Christine Milne, and has shown a greater willingness to negotiate over legislation with the Coalition government.
That willingness to negotiate on issues such as pensions reform has caused deep unease with some Greens, who argue that negotiating with the Coalition is tantamount to assisting ideological enemies and that compromises should not be made.
Dr Di Natale said in a statement that "most new leaders build their own team and I firmly believe that Cate and our new team are the best in the Parliament".
A senior Greens staffer also played down the exodus, arguing some people had been on temporary contracts, some had run for office themselves and some staff had - after serving the senator for an extended period of time - finally decided to move on.
One of the former staffers for Dr Di Natale, Gavan McFadzean - a former communications director - would say only that he had left because "there was a difference over strategic direction among senior staff in the organisation, heading into the election".
