The outgoing public service chief, John Lloyd, breached the public service code of conduct by “failing to uphold the good reputation” of his agency when he passed research on to the Institute of Public Affairs.

The merit protection commissioner, Linda Waugh, has concluded that Lloyd should have considered that his action would look like “a political action … to build a coalition of support for his views” when he passed the document to the conservative thinktank, which he used to lead.

Waugh submitted the report into Lloyd’s misconduct to the parliament’s presiding officers on Wednesday, his last day in the role as Australian public service commissioner, but the conduct was not considered as being of “sufficient gravity” to warrant a recommendation that a sanction be imposed.

In a letter sent to the anonymous complainant, seen by Guardian Australia, outlining the outcome of the investigation Waugh rejected a number of other allegations against Lloyd including that he had failed to act honestly or use commonwealth resources in a proper manner.

The complaint relates to Lloyd’s contact with the IPA, including an email in which he attached a document which he said “highlights some of the more generous agreement provisions applying to APS employees”.

At Senate estimates in October Lloyd defended his links to the IPA, rejecting the allegation that giving the information amounted to special access because it was publicly available in public service enterprise agreements.

Waugh found that by providing the document titled “Examples of soft arrangements in commonwealth enterprise agreements” to the IPA, Lloyd had failed to uphold the public service’s values “in particular the ethical value” that employees “should act in a way that models and promotes the highest standard of ethical behaviour”.

Lloyd also failed to uphold “the good reputation of his agency” in breach of section 13(11) of the APS code of conduct, the letter said.

“The direct provision of the APSC document by Mr Lloyd to the IPA staff member following a private telephone discussion failed to give consideration to the clear attendant risk of potential consequences for his position,” Waugh said.

“It was clear that such action would likely be viewed by critics as a strategic and controversial initiative by Mr Lloyd to build a coalition of support for his views, and as a political action if it were to become publicly known, as it subsequently did.”

The IPA is a fierce public critic of public service conditions and called for 27,000 jobs to be slashed in December.

Waugh said there were “alternative courses (eg publishing the document so that its existence and content was available to everyone or passing the request to another senior officer to deal with) available to Mr Lloyd to mitigate these risks, but Mr Lloyd did not choose to do this”.

Waugh told the complainant the only available sanction was “removal from office on the ground of misbehaviour” but she did not regard the misconduct to be of “sufficient gravity to warrant the making of any recommendation that a sanction be imposed”, irrespective of Lloyd’s “imminent departure”.

In Senate estimates in May the Labor leader in the Senate, Penny Wong, said the opposition believed Lloyd was “unfit” to hold his office because he was “partisan”, which Lloyd rejected.

A spokeswoman for the APSC said the agency had not been formally advised of the outcome of the investigation, so was unable to comment.

Waugh said the inquiry had been concluded and confirmed the report on its results had been passed to the presiding officers of the parliament. “I have no other comment on this matter.”