The federal government is facing calls to establish an independent arbiter of ministerial standards as it continues to grapple with fallout from the sports rorts scandal.
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Following the resignation of former agriculture minister Bridget McKenzie scrutiny has turned to Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet secretary Philip Gaetjens and his investigation into whether the former National Party deputy leader breached the government's ministerial standards.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison said Mr Gaetjen's report, which has not been released, found that Senator McKenzie contravened the code by failing to declare her membership of the Wangaratta Clay Target Club, which received a $36,000 grant from the Community Sport Infrastructure program she administered.
"Standards ... are about accountability and they are about, even in tough circumstances like this, where the Minister obviously did not stand to realise any pecuniary or any direct personal benefit, the standards require a disclosure of interests and, in particular, one where there invites a conflict of interest for a program they might be overseeing," Mr Morrison said in announcing the Senator's resignation on Sunday.
But governance and public policy experts have cast doubt on the process.
Australian National University professor of public policy and former Australian Public Service Commissioner Andrew Podger said commissioning the head of PM&C to review Senator McKenzie's conduct was inappropriate.
Professor Podger said that if ministerial standards were political, rather than legal, in nature then the views of the PM&C secretary were "not relevant".
But if the government intended them to have greater standing, they needed to be overseen by an independent individual or body.
"If what is intended to be a higher set of standards of behaviour then there should be an independent person clearly authorised to give the prime minister advice," he said.
Professor Podger the most appropriate arrangement would be a parliamentary integrity officer or some form of anti-graft organisation such as a Commonwealth Independent Commission Against Corruption.
The two-week Gaetjens inquiry is not the first time the head of PM&C has been called upon by government to investigate ministerial conduct.
Former department secretary Martin Parkinson was asked to examine the conduct of several ministers and former ministers including Stuart Robert, Julie Bishop and Christopher Pyne.
Senior Research Fellow at Melbourne School of Government Dr Martin Bortz said getting the head of PM&C to investigate the conduct of ministers was "weird".
The Australian National Audit Office found that in her administration of the sports program, Senator McKenzie largely ignored the advice of Sports Australia in awarding $100 million of grants to clubs in marginal and targeted electorates in the lead-up to the last election.
The government has insisted that all grant recipients were eligible under the terms of program, and Dr Bortz said it was "entirely appropriate" for ministers to exercise discretion in the administration of government schemes.
He said the public did not want ministers who blindly followed the advice of the public service.
But he said that exercising discretion came with responsibility.
"You can ignore the advice of the public service, but do so at your own peril," Dr Bortz said, and questioned the use of the PM&C secretary to investigate the conduct of ministers.
"It feels weird, especially when we have got independent bodies like the Auditor-General [Grant Hehir] and the Commonwealth Ombudsman," he said.