The response of the Obama administration to the Gulf of Mexico oil spill has sparked political arguments between the members of the House of Representatives on Thursday, more than a year after the economic and environmental disaster occurred.

The Obama administration decided to give the owner of the well, BP PLC, the lead role to respond to the oil spill. However, a new report released by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee asserted that the federal government should have been responsible for the spill response, as well as the compensation of the victims.

U.S. House Republicans said letting BP PLC lead the oil spill recovery efforts is completely offensive to the residents in the Gulf Coast. Meanwhile, Haley Barbour, the governor of Mississippi, disagreed with the recently released report.

Barbour, who is also a Republican, told the reform committee that BP was at times more responsive than the government to the requests made by state officials after the spill occurred in April 2010.

Still, some U.S. lawmakers believe that BP is not completing its obligations to the oil spill. They criticized President Obama for not taking control.

Darrell Issa, chairman of the committee, said failure to subsidize removal of debris, ambiguity in the services provided for mental health, as well as frustration related to the compensation process are just among the apprehensions of the residents affected with the spill.

An explosion on the drilling equipment killed eleven BP workers. It broke the vessel and spilled million barrels of crude oil into the Gulf Coast. President Obama banned deep-water drilling until October last year.