FORMER NSW Labor ministers aren't the only ones sitting on tidy payouts; their staffers received more than $5 million in redundancy payments after the election.

A golden handshake worth an average of $30,000 each was given to 170 Labor staffers, documents provided to The Sun-Herald under freedom of information laws show.

Staffers to former planning minister Tony Kelly were paid the most, with almost half a million dollars going to employees made redundant after Labor lost office.

The staff of former Premier Kristina Keneally received $470,940 and staff of former community services minister Linda Burney received $393,404.

Of the 20 ministerial offices that paid out their staff, 12 offices paid out more than $200,000.

Former arts minister Virginia Judge cost the state the least in redundancy payments: just over $85,000.

Departmental staff numbers published in December last year show six Keneally staffers were on the maximum salary of between $151,992 to $289,500 a year, compared with one person on a comparable salary in Ms Burney's and Mr Kelly's offices.

Greens MP David Shoebridge said staffers were entitled to redundancy payments, but the cost to the state exceeded expectation.

''What I'm concerned about is the number of people that were on enormously high wages,'' Mr Shoebridge said.

''When you look at the figures, that is the real issue - there was a number of highly paid Labor political operatives that were being paid more than parliamentarians.''

A spokesman for Premier Barry O'Farrell refused to comment.

The Department of Premier and Cabinet refused to disclose a breakdown of exactly how much each staff member was paid, citing privacy concerns.

The department said: ''In this case … I consider that the release of a document containing the actual redundancies of particular individuals would involve an unreasonable disclosure of personal information.''

Under their contract, ministerial staffers are entitled to a minimum of three weeks' pay for each year of service, with a maximum payment of 39 weeks' pay.