"All I'm doing is getting dressed and going to work," Buckley said.
Several viewers have complained that Buckley's on-air outfits are too tight-fitting for a woman seven months pregnant.
"Nicky Buckley, why don't you dress with more decorum instead of flaunting your pregnancy in skin-tight clothes?" wrote one viewer to a newspaper.
Another said: "Couldn't Nicky Buckley wear more suitable clothing and give her on-camera appearance more dignity? "Nicky obviously wants this huge stomach look. When is one of the fashion houses going to make Nicky Buckley some nice maternity dresses? Until then, Glenn (Ridge), stop telling her she looks great. She doesn't."
Buckley, who is married to Sale model Murray Bingham, said she has also been surprised by some people's assumption that she would - or should - stop working, or that she would be permanently replaced as co-host.
Buckley, who is in good health, intends to continue working for as long as possible and resume duties as soon as she is able to in mid-June.
"Why is it OK for a woman in an office to work up until she's due? Why should I stop work? People forget that this is my job," she said.
Peter Meakin, the Nine Network's head of news and current affairs, is bemused by the Buckley controversy.
"I think in the old days management tended to be embarrassed about women being seen to be pregnant on air - I really don't know why," he said.
"I think we're more mature about women in a number of areas. It's now accepted that pregnancy is not a blot on the television landscape."
Buckley said that while she felt no compulsion to conceal her changing profile, she had problems finding clothes. "There's not a lot of evening wear in the maternity line," she said.
Meakin suspects that the criticism is coming from "a small and unliberated" section of the female audience.
"The harshest critics of women on camera are other women," Meakin said.
But Buckley is reluctant to blame older women.
"I've had such wonderful support from them - little booties and baby clothes," she said. The controversy does not seem to have harmed the ratings. Sale of the Century figures - numerical and maternal - are in enviable shape.
by Barbara Hooks