Prime Minister Tony Abbott has sent an unmistakable message that public servants are there to do what they are told, and those with other ideas won't be tolerated, writes Mungo MacCallum.

There are basically two sorts of leaders. There are the ones who treat their fellows as potential allies and the others who assume from the start that all those around them are potential enemies.

Tony Abbott has already declared himself in the latter camp. His apologists have pointed out that his purge of the public service was not as gory as that of his mentor John Howard; on assuming office in 1996, Howard sacked six permanent heads in what became notorious as the worst bloodbath in the history of the service. Abbott has only axed three - well, so far at least. But the victims' only crime appears to be that they were loyal servants of Abbott's Labor predecessors.

Don Russell was Paul Keating's chief of staff, almost his alter ego, so was marked from the start - although it is hard to see what partisanship he showed as head of the Department of Innovation and Industry. Blair Comley, in Resources, previously worked on Kevin Rudd's model for an Emissions Trading Scheme. Andrew Metcalfe in Agriculture once defended Julia Gillard's Malaysia solution when secretary of Immigration.

All three are widely experienced and respected by their peers. None has ever been accused or suspected of any impropriety - except the thought crime of getting on too well with their Labor ministers. The same may apply to Treasury secretary Martin Parkinson who is going on extended leave. Parkinson, like Comley, was involved in the design of Rudd's ETS, but more significantly has been the target of new Treasurer Joe Hockey, who more than once accused him and his colleagues of doctoring the numbers to produce the results Labor governments wanted - a very serious charge amounting to outright corruption. No evidence was ever adduced but Parkinson was, and is, clearly on the enemies list. His future is at best uncertain.

And then there are - or were - Peter Baxter, the director-general of the formerly independent AusAID, now merged with Foreign Affairs, whose exact fate remains unknown, and Tim Flannery, whose Climate Commission has been abolished altogether. Many lesser lights are simply collateral damage - although we should not forget Steve Bracks, whose appointment as consul-general to New York was abruptly cancelled as he was in the process of taking it up.

Various reasons were adduced, the most risible being George Brandis's assertion that Bracks, a former state premier, was underqualified for the job. What, like senator Michael Baume, given the job in 1996 by John Howard as a blatant reward for unswerving loyalty? This was the man dismissed by Paul Keating as "a piece of parliamentary filth". At least Bracks never had to wear such contumely.

It was not always thus. In the old days, incoming prime ministers respected the role of the permanent public service and never thought to question the integrity of senior figures. In 1949, Robert Menzies preserved virtually all of Ben Chifley's senior team, including socialists like HC "Nugget" Coombs, who became one of his most trusted advisers. Even after 23 years of conservative rule, Gough Whitlam moved just two of the departmental heads sideways, and kept Tories like Arthur Tange and James Plimsoll in their jobs. And Malcolm Fraser even retained Whitlam's former private secretary, John Menadue, as his secretary of the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet.

It was Bob Hawke who altered the system by removing the guarantee of permanency. But he did not use the change as an excuse to politicise the service; even such partisan figures as John Stone, who later stood for parliament on behalf of Sir Joh Bjelke-Petersen, survived unscathed. It was John Howard who broke the mould, openly seeking to stack the service with his own supporters - not merely Liberals, but Howardists.

It was made clear from the top down that loyalty to the government was to be the prerequisite for career advancement. Not only would recalcitrants be punished - and the awful example of the sacked six showed that the punishment would be swift and ruthless - but fealty would be rewarded. Thus, when a hitherto anonymous bureaucrat named Jane Halton became known for her role in the children overboard incident in 2001, immediately after the following election she was appointed head of the Health Department.

To his credit, Kevin Rudd, who had himself worked in the public service and knew the dangers of politicising its members, attempted to restore the old ways; to the surprise and annoyance of many of his colleagues, even Halton kept her job. But it appears that Abbott intends to revert to, and exploit, the Howard model. The first duty of the public service will not be, as its name implies, to serve the public; it will be to serve the government of the day, to look after its interests by whatever means are necessary.

It could prove a dangerous path. Not only is it an incitement to sycophancy - ministers may find themselves surrounded by yes-men and yes-women, both inside and outside the office - but it will be a serious disincentive to those considering the public service as a career option.

But with a Prime Minister not particularly interested in policy reform, and one who believes that he can get all the guidance he needs from his appointed staff and trusted confidantes (including, of course, his personal confessor, Cardinal George Pell) the public service was always going to be a touch superfluous anyway. Its role will not be to provide frank and fearless advice; it will be to implement government policy, to do what it is told.

Yes, the old days are gone. There is a story that when Sir Robert Menzies was planning to make an economic statement he called his public service experts - the Chifleyites Nugget Coombs, Richard Randall and Roland Wilson - in for a conference and read them a draft. When he had finished, Coombs replied: "Prime Minister, you have just told us what you would like to do. We shall now tell you what you are able to do."

So they did, and he did it. His original proposal would have led to disaster. It is not to late for Abbott to learn from the master.

Mungo Wentworth MacCallum is a political journalist and commentator. View his full profile here.