Deputy Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce has postponed plans to move the Canberra-based Murray-Darling Basin Authority to regional Victoria until after the election.
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The decision comes as Mr Joyce faces criticism for announcing 170 public servants will be relocated from Canberra to his own seat of New England should the Coalition government be returned.
Plans to move the Australian Pesticides and Veterinary Medicines Authority have been condemned by public sector unions, farming lobby groups, the federal opposition and ACT Liberal senator Zed Seselja.
On Tuesday, Mr Joyce said no further relocations would be announced before the election. He would not confirm the long-term plans for the nearly 300 staff at the Murray-Darling Basin authority.
"Let's take one fight at a time," he said in northern Victoria. "People know what we're up to, we're decentralising and that's what the National Party does."
"We believe that the largesse of government should be spread around the countryside and not stacked in a corner."
Mr Joyce launched the decentralisation program in 2014 and told three rural research agencies to prepare costings for a move to regional areas.
The Armidale relocation was announced before a cost-benefit analysis of the proposal – ordered by Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull – was completed and in the midst of an election battle to secure his seat.
Nationals MP Andrew Broad called for the authority to be to moved Mildura in his own electorate of Mallee. Other candidates suggested Shepparton, Deniliquin and Adelaide as possible destinations.
On Tuesday, Canberra MP Gai Brodtmann wrote to Mr Joyce urging him to reconsider the relocation to Armidale. She told him many public servants were unwilling to move.
"It is regrettable that a victory for your local constituents should come at the expense of mine," she said.
"There are now hundreds of Canberra families facing disruption. Children will be taken out of their local schools.
"Partners may have to quit their own job. Lives built in Canberra will be put on hold."
When Mr Joyce announced the relocation, he insisted any move to Armidale would be voluntary.
"There is some apprehensiveness from some, there always is," he said. "We're not asking people to move to Kathmandu or Timbuktu.
"When they started moving departments to Canberra, Canberra wasn't there. Here we have a beautiful, vibrant, excited, cultivated and well-established city and also great for families."
Senator Seselja criticised the relocation as bad news for Canberra and hoped it would be reconsidered after the election.
"Unfortunately, what some members of Parliament, some ministers in this case, don't seem to appreciate is the great level of expertise that resides in Canberra," he said.
