Federal Labor has agreed to the independents' parliamentary reforms, but the coalition is "dragging its feet" on the issue, government house leader Anthony Albanese says.
The reforms - driven by Lyne MP Rob Oakeshott and his fellow rural independents Tony Windsor and Bob Katter - include time limits for questions and answers, an independent speaker and an acknowledgement of country before prayers.
There's also be a new turbo-charged committee system and a parliamentary budget office.
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"The prime minister signed on behalf of Labor yesterday with Rob Oakeshott," Mr Albanese told the Nine Network on Sunday, adding the coalition was now "dragging its feet".
"It would appear they've changed their views on some of the positions that have been put forward, such as the nature of the arrangements to ensure the independence of the speaker," Mr Albanese said.
The coalition wanted the speaker to be "automatically" drawn from the opposition.
The document Labor has backed allows for the speaker to come from either party or be non-aligned.
If the speaker does comes from a particular party the deputy speaker will come from the other side of politics.
Paring arrangements will be in place for both - meaning their vote will be cancelled out rather than lost.
"That will take away the need in the view of a tied vote for whoever's in the chair to cast a vote," Mr Albanese said.
Further, both the speaker and the deputy won't attend their respective party room meetings.
"We don't have a fixed view as to where the speaker should be from," Mr Albanese said.
"The point is, wherever the speaker is from they should withdraw from party processes. That's how you ensure there's independence of the speaker."
Questions during Question Time will be limited to 30 seconds and answers will be restricted to three minutes. They'll have to be "directly relevant".
Mr Albanese said the speaker would be able to rule out questions that were "argumentative or don't ask for issues of fact".
A parliamentary budget office will also be established within the parliamentary library.
"It will be able to look at issues including costings, particularly from the opposition but also individual members," Labor's house leader said.
Mr Oakeshott wants both sides of politics to sign off on the parliamentary reforms before he announces whether he'll back Prime Minister Julia Gillard or Opposition Leader Tony Abbott.
