NATIONALS leader and Deputy Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce is expecting a baby with one of his former staff members, Vikki Campion.

Ms Campion, 33, a former journalist and deputy chief of staff of The Daily Telegraph left Mr Joyce’s office in April last year.

She has moved in with Mr Joyce and is due to give birth in April, according to The Telegraph, “devastating” Mr Joyce’s wife and family.

The relationship, it’s been revealed today, has long been an open secret in Canberra, with even Labor MPs suggesting it was widely known.

Labor has long suspected something was happening in the Joyce/Campion relationship because both were persistent smokers.

They would regularly get together in a Parliament House garden to chat and puff away.

Their favourite spot happened to be outside the office of a senior ALP figure, who began to notice an increasing number of cigarette get-togethers.

But Opposition sources today made clear they had no intention of exploiting Mr Joyce’s new relationship for political purposes, and shadow transport minister Anthony Albanese said there was “no public interest in a public discussion of it”.

“People cannot possibly know what people’s personal circumstances are,” Mr Albanese said on Adelaide radio 5AA.

“Certainly I, and I would hope no one on my side of politics, is going to participate in a public debate.”

On the same program Defence Industries Minister Christopher Pyne criticised publication of the relationship and pregnancy.

“I think one of the great things about Australia is that we haven’t gone down this tabloid journalism, Fleet Street approach of the London and the UK press,” Mr Pyne said.

“I think it’s a good testament to our democracy. I think it’s a great pity that this has happened to Barnaby Joyce and his family and it must be very traumatising for everyone, made much worse by being publicised on the front page of the newspapers.

“I agree with Anthony that we should argue a lot about good policy for Australia. MPs’ private lives, business people’s private lives, journalists private lives should be off the record.”

Mr Joyce, 50, revealed in Parliament in December last year that he had split from his wife of 24 years, Natalie Joyce, saying: “I acknowledge that I’m currently separated, so that’s on the record.”

In a statement this morning, Mrs Joyce said the situation was “devastating”.

“The situation is devastating, for my girls who are affected by the family breakdown and for me as a wife of 24 years who placed my own career on hold to support Barnaby through his political life,” she told the Telegraph.

“Naturally we feel deceived and hurt by the actions of Barnaby and the staff member involved.”

Friends have reportedly told the newspaper Mr Joyce is said to be “madly in love”.

But neither Mr Joyce nor Ms Campion have spoken publicly about their situation.

Before announcing his separation, the Deputy Prime Minister had frequently spoken about his wife and family in public.

In an interview with The Weekend Australian Magazine last year, his wife told the story of how the pair met.

The romantic encounter took place when they started studying at the University of New England.

“The first time we spoke was O Week,” she said. “The last day was a car rally in a ute and he just came up to me and went ‘You’ll do’.”

According to the profile, Mr Joyce commented, “I had all the lines”, and appeared “mortified”.

In that same article the Nationals leader revealed how little time he spent at home with his family. His diary at the time showed only two days over the months of February and March that he would sleep at home in his own bed.

Mr and Mrs Joyce have four daughters tougher — Bridgette, Julia, Caroline and Odette.

Mrs Joyce said at the time the family had taken a “back seat” to Mr Joyce’s career. He entered politics when the youngest, Odette, was only 18 months.

“We’re probably lucky, and not so lucky in a way, that (the children) were so young when he started so they don’t really know any different,” Mrs Joyce said.

“Every time he’d come home (Odette) actually wouldn’t go near him because he hadn’t been home. It’s taken a long time to get that father-daughter rapport.”

Mr Joyce described feeling “guilt” over not always being there for his daughters.

“I hate it,” he told the magazine. “In the end they give up on you. They just don’t think you’re going to be there.”

Leading up to the New England by-election last year — after Mr Joyce was dismissed from Parliament by the High Court over his dual citizen status with New Zealand — his wife and children did not accompany him on the campaign trail.

Mrs Joyce was also absent when her husband voted with his mother, and was nowhere to be seen when he was sworn back into Parliament.

By contrast, during the 2016 federal election, Mr Joyce’s family were frequently seen on the hustings.

His 2017 by-election campaign was dogged by rumours of the now exposed relationship.

During the campaign, Mr Joyce was hounded by an individual, who he later dubbed a stalker, who raised his family situation at a pub sparking a heated verbal clash.

Mr Joyce was understood to have knocked the man’s hat off his had during the Monday night confrontation at a New England pub.

He acknowledged the rumours when he was reinstalled as an MP last year and confirmed his separation.

“I didn’t come to this pretending to be a saint,” he said.

The revelation comes on the first sitting parliamentary week of the year as politicians returned to Canberra. Mr Joyce’s colleagues from all sides of politics have begun to weigh in on the report.

“It’s something I view as none of my business,” Labor frontbencher Tony Burke told reporters in Canberra on Wednesday.

“This ricochets and affects families. There’s a principle here that I’ve always abided by to not engage in anything that hits the private lives of other members of parliament.”

Greens MP Adam Bandt agreed, describing the prominent media coverage as a “very dark day” for gender equality.

“I don’t really care who Barnaby Joyce or anyone else is sleeping with,” he told Sky News.

“Unless it impacts on his job, or unless she chooses voluntarily to step into the public eye, it’s not really anyone’s business.

“If it’s Barnaby Joyce’s partner today, who else’s will it be tomorrow?”

Cabinet minister Dan Tehan said the decision to put such information into the public domain should be up to the individuals involved.

However, gay rights campaigner Rodney Croome unloaded both barrels on the “hypocrite” deputy prime minister, who vehemently opposed same-sex marriage and demanded the issue be put to a national vote.

“You can’t put the lives of tens of thousands of your fellow citizens under the microscope and then expect to avoid scrutiny yourself,” Mr Croome said. He argued the scandal exposed what “traditional marriage” meant for people like Mr Joyce.

“It is not a set of standards for heterosexual couples to live up to. It is a euphemism for prejudice against LGBTI people and our exclusion from the core institutions of society,” Mr Croome said.