THE federal attorney-general's department has denied dramatically increasing a compensation offer to Peter Slipper's former staffer to prevent the public airing of lurid sex texts.

Department secretary Roger Wilkins was one of several public servants to front a Senate estimates committee and withstand a coalition grilling on the matter.



Of several revelations from Tuesday's estimates, the government was understood to have initially tried to have James Ashby's claims struck out, before putting three successive settlements on the table.



The first, in June, offered no compensation, but that increased to $15,000 in September and then $50,000 later that month, which was accepted.



"All that changed, I put to you, was that your client - the attorney-general - had come to appreciate the real sign for her and the government of the publication of the text messages,'' shadow attorney-general George Brandis put to Mr Wilkins.



"That's not the case senator,'' Mr Wilkins said.



The publication of offensive text messages sent by Mr Slipper to Mr Ashby eventually resulted in him resigning as Speaker last week.



Mr Wilkins denied the department was driven by political motivations in its defence of the case.

Earlier, the Australian government solicitor threw 17 lawyers at its defence of sexual harassment claims brought by James Ashby against former speaker Peter Slipper.

Despite the extraordinary resources devoted to the case, the secretary of the Attorney-General's Department told a senate estimates hearing last night it was possible not all of Mr Slipper's vulgar text messages were read before the Commonwealth attempted to have the case struck out.

It also emerged that Julian Burnside QC was paid $4800 a day to represent the Commonwealth with the huge team devoted to defending the case partly explaining how the Commonwealth legal bill topped $700,000 in a case settled last month for just $50,000.

The resources were also devoted to the case, despite Australian government solicitor CEO Ian Govey telling the hearing last night the sexual harassment claim brought by Mr Slipper's former staffer was not considered "exceptional."

He said three lawyers were devoted to the case while the other 14 worked on it at times.

Opposition legal spokesman George Brandis said only a handful of lawyers were devoted to cases where millions were at stake and he questioned why so many lawyers were tasked to the Slipper case.

It also emerged that Attorney-General Nicola Roxon, who conceded on Monday after days of claiming professional privilege she knew of the contents of Mr Slipper's texts before the Commonwealth strike out application, that she was likely briefed on June 9.

Originally published as Govt denies sex texts swayed compo