Martin Parkinson ceases being the secretary of the prime minister’s department at 5pm on Friday. But before he vacated his position, he first had to deal with Malcolm Roberts and Jacqui Lambie, and the Senate’s finance and public administration committee.

Parkinson hadn’t wanted to attend Friday morning’s proceedings, but the Senate committee examining Christopher Pyne and Julie Bishop’s controversial acceptance of private-sector jobs, post-politics, in fields overlapping directly with their portfolio experience, insisted, correctly, that he show up.

So there the mandarin was, straight-backed at a table in a committee room on his last day in the job, with a One Nation senator demanding to know how these appointments – Pyne to a consulting firm, EY, wanting to build its defence business, and Bishop to Palladium, one of the government’s biggest private aid contractors – passed “the pub test”.

Roberts, who hovers perpetually, pursed lipped, on the brink of outrage, wasn’t at all sure these “cushy” jobs upheld the dignity of the parliament.

Parkinson noted in the mild tone of a telephone counsellor he was quite sure that parliamentarians didn’t want public servants, even venerable ones like the head of PMC, starting to “speculate” about whether the behaviour of the political class was consistent with the dignity of parliaments.

It wasn’t clear whether or not Parkinson’s checkmate was absorbed by Roberts, who travels in his own orbit, but it didn’t matter, because Lambie was next in any case, on the line from Tasmania.

Lambie unfurled a homily about mobile phone numbers, and who was in the know about them, that was a little digressive, but in the end quite effective.

She wanted to know about the concept of information, as it was referenced in the ministerial standards. Does information, for example, include a former minister having the personal contact details of stakeholders like, for example, the secretary of the department of defence?

Parkinson dead batted. A mobile number for the defence secretary was certainly information, yes. But he said he would not regard that particular telephone number as being particularly private, given a lot of people would have it, and any member of the public could call his office and ask to speak to him.

Lambie persisted. How about Mark Stewart from EY? Would that number be private information? Parkinson professed no deep insight. “You’d have to ask Mark Stewart,” he said. “I’m pretty sure if I needed to get on to Mark Stewart in about five or 10 minutes, and I’ve never met Mr Stewart”.

Lambie wanted to know whether an ordinary member of the public could get on to Stewart in five or 10 minutes? Yes, Parkinson thought. You’d only need to ring EY’s switchboard in Adelaide.

Hanging in the room was a supplementary question, neither posed, nor answered – why would a partner in a major consulting firm return an unsolicited call from a member of the public with whom he had no relationship? It seemed reasonably unlikely.

A slightly Pythonesque exchange ensued. Could the secretary, Lambie wondered, track down Stewart’s private number in five or 10 minutes as flagged, and then table it in Friday’s proceedings. Parkinson said he was “not inclined to do that” but offered to locate the company switchboard number instead. After a brief shuffling of papers, the switchboard number was procured.

Lambie was unimpressed with Parkinson failing to produce Stewart’s private number. Parkinson was unimpressed with his cameo in Lambie’s now obvious blindingly homily about the objective difference between people circulating in the political class, then seamlessly circulating in the corporate world, and the people left outside that networked eco-system, looking in on it, wondering whether the whole caper was cooked.

If the public doesn’t have access to information, like Stewart’s number, or the defence departmental head’s number, then that was private information, restricted to those in the know, Lambie insisted. Like Pyne, was her unstated rebuke.

“No,” Parkinson said, ever so slightly at sea in the Parable of the Insider. “Did Pyne have access to this private information,” Lambie wondered. “I have absolutely no idea,” Parkinson said, ever so slightly exasperated. “Senator, I did not ask”.

Parkinson fronted the committee on Friday because he’d investigated and cleared (in exemplary bureaucratese) Pyne and Bishop of breaching rules in the ministerial standards designed to stop ministers using their inside knowledge and contacts for private gain.

Having been asked by Scott Morrison to investigate, Parkinson spoke to both and found in July “no grounds to believe that either Mr Pyne of Ms Bishop [had] breached the standards”.

Parkinson said he was not required to administer the 'pub test', he was required to administer a document formulated by his political masters.

The non-government senators were inclined to see fundamental errors in Parkinson’s reasoning. But as the secretary pointed out, he was the keeper of a code of bipartisan creation. The ministerial standards had remained the same for 12 years – there under Kevin Rudd, Julia Gillard and Kevin Rudd, and there under Tony Abbott, Malcolm Turnbull and Scott Morrison.

Parkinson said he was not required to administer the “pub test”, he was required to administer a document formulated by his political masters. Lest this nuance be unclear, he told the displeased senators he had “no investigative powers” and “no legislative backing” – his remit was to speak to protagonists thought to be at risk of breach, and make judgments.

When speaking to Pyne and Bishop, at Morrison’s behest, about whether their new roles were or were not consistent with the code, he carried with him a presumption of innocence. Perhaps I’m “naive”, Parkinson said, but he professed to taking the information he was given at face value “unless I can find other information”.

Implied by the witness, but not stated – that would be indelicate, although certainly not unwarranted – was the people who had the power to do something about the blindingly obvious laxity of the ministerial standards were the people asking the questions.

The political masters. Not the bureaucrat answering their questions in his last hours serving the Australian public.

And with that, Parkinson was thanked for his service, tidied his papers, and walked into the next chapter of life.