PM&C secretary Phil Gaetjens a 'cover-up expert' burying Coalition govt secrets: Senator Rex Patrick

But the South Australian senator has dismissed the claims, saying it is the department's secretary Phil Gaetjens who has undermined public faith in the bureaucracy by serving as a "cover-up expert" ready to bury the government's secrets.

Senator Patrick, speaking in the Senate on Tuesday, rejected complaints raised by Mr Gaetjens and public service commissioner Peter Woolcott about the senator's decision to name Department of the Prime Minister & Cabinet official Angie McKenzie after she refused him access to national cabinet documents under FOI laws.

Mr Gaetjens and Mr Woolcott wrote to Senate President Slade Brockman on Friday saying Senator Patrick had misused his parliamentary immunity, and that his statements about Ms McKenzie should be referred to the privileges committee for formal review.

Senator Patrick responded in the Senate on Tuesday, calling Mr Gaetjens a "disgrace" who was "happy to act as the Prime Minister's henchman, covering up all manner of sins and corruption in the government and particularly other ministers' offices".

"The secretary of PM&C is a cover-up expert," Senator Patrick said.

"If there is some dark secret that the government needs to bury, Gaetjens is the man who's got the shovel.

"A fish rots from the head and when the head is rotten, no-one is likely to have faith in the remainder of the fish."

Mr Gaetjens and Mr Woolcott said Senator Patrick's comments last week were likely to undermine public confidence in the public service.

"In his comments, Senator Patrick attacked the integrity and reputation of the public service. In doing so, he has demoralised tens of thousands of public servants who seek to do their best for their country every day," they wrote.

"The broader impact of an elected official attacking an impartial public servant is damaging to our system of government."

Senator Patrick last week called Ms McKenzie, a PM&C assistant secretary and FOI official, "incompetent" and "politicised", accusing her of doing the government's bidding after she blocked access to secret national cabinet documents.

Ms McKenzie refused access to the documents after finding they were exempt under cabinet secrecy rules.

It followed an Administrative Appeals Tribunal finding in August that the national cabinet was not a subcommittee of the federal cabinet.

In her decision, Ms McKenzie found the national cabinet was a committee of the federal cabinet for the purposes of the freedom of information laws.

Mr Gaetjens and Mr Woolcott said Senator Patrick's comments were damaging to Ms McKenzie's personal and professional reputation, and she had limited opportunity to respond.

"If Senator Patrick's comments, made under privilege, had been made in most other workplaces they could be characterised as bullying and harassment," they wrote.

"In other Australian workplaces, these remarks could be made the subject of disciplinary review and potentially pursued in action for defamation.

"Ms McKenzie is a highly regarded and competent, professional public servant and conducts herself with the highest standards of integrity.

"As Ms McKenzie's employer, we strongly object to Senator Patrick's unwarranted and offensive remarks and ask that Senator Patrick be directed to withdraw these comments."

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Senator Patrick doubled down in response on Tuesday, and criticised another departmental FOI official, assistant secretary Hugh Cameron, for refusing access to national cabinet documents in another request.

He said Mr Cameron's decision was "to all intents" a carbon copy of Ms McKenzie's and had rejected access in finding the documents were covered by cabinet confidentiality rules.

"Here we have another official politicised and disrespectful to the rule of law," Senator Patrick said.

"Presumably he too will get a pat on the head from Mr Gaetjens.

"But in actual fact it's a case of Tweedledee and, with Mr Cameron, Tweedledumber."

Finance Minister Simon Birmingham responded to Senator Patrick in the Senate, describing his latest comments as an "extraordinary display impugning motives against senior officials in the Australian Public Service".

"Those of us in public office are fair game in this place, for the political debates that occur," Senator Birmingham said.

However while public servants answered questions in Parliament during Senate estimates, they were not elected officials

"We ought to respect that those public servants are not elected officials, and they are not public officials, and they are individuals who rightly have accountability mechanisms and processes in place in the way in which they conduct their duties."

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