The Victorian Government wants the ombudsman to investigate more than a dozen Coalition MPs over the possible misuse of public funds in connection to a fraud orchestrated by former Liberal Party state director Damien Mantach.

In a dramatic escalation of its response to continued Opposition attacks over the so-called "rorts for votes" scandal, the Labor Government used Parliament to make the referral about Mr Mantach and Liberal Party MPs.

Mr Mantach was jailed in 2015 for stealing $1.5 million from the Liberal Party through falsified and inflated invoices.

In August 2015, the Liberal Party repaid the Parliament $200,000 amid fears the money spent on MP mailouts may have been misused in a kickback scheme.

Damien Mantach is serving a jail sentence for fraud. ( Facebook )

Deputy Premier, James Merlino, moved a motion that the matter be referred to the Ombudsman, naming more than a dozen Liberal MPs.

He said the ombudsman needed to investigate whether the MPs knew, or ought to have known, they were approving inflated invoices.

It comes as Victoria Police's fraud squad investigates Labor's misuse of taxpayer-funded electorate officers to campaign for votes in 2014.

In March the Ombudsman found that Labor had wrongly used electorate officers to conduct political campaigning and the ALP repaid $388,000.

Labor has repaid $388,000 in public funds that were misused during the 2014 campaign. ( AAP )

Mr Merlino also used Parliament to call on the Ombudsman to investigate Nationals MP for Lowan Emma Kealy, alleging she tried to get around electoral advertising rules by pre-paying for ads before the November election.

Ms Kealy is accused of asking The Hamilton Spectator to issue her invoices dated October.

In an internal email, one advertising staff member at the newspaper writes to her colleagues that a woman in Ms Kealy's office "has requested that we send all invoices that are currently owing for future bookings for Emma Kealy to her for payment please."

"Can we make sure November bookings have October dates on the invoices? Due to government rules around the elections they are not allowed to process anything with November dates on!"

MPs may spend money from their office budgets on advertising, but during the caretaker period of the campaign, taxpayer funds cannot be used for advertising.

The Hamilton Spectator issued a statement on social media saying the content of the email was inaccurate and misrepresented communication between the newspaper and the MP's office.

"Ms Kealy and her office have never, at any time requested to have invoices changed, altered or amended," the newspaper said.

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Ms Kealy also denied her office had asked for doctored invoices.

"There is no email or any record of communication from my office consistent with this concocted claim," she said.

In response to Mr Merlino's ombudsman referral, Opposition frontbencher Tim Smith suggested that the email could have been forged.

"This is Keystone Cops stuff from Daniel Andrews and James Merlino," Mr Smith said.

"Damien Mantach was referred to police by the Liberal Party and correctly went to jail.

"The brainiacs on Labor's tactics group have reminded us all that people who commit fraud should go to jail. Thanks."