A good many police outside the AFP senior executive structure are desperately hoping that the new commissioner will be an outsider, not one of those directing the AFP, or setting the examples, over recent years. The AFP has had only three commissioners over the past 20 years, and only two over the past 12. While Mick Keelty, commissioner between 2001 and 2009, had a far more outgoing media style than Negus, they were close colleagues, and the Negus period in office has seen a continuation of a similar general style of management, with many of the same players who advanced up the ranks under Keelty..

That style is said by internal critics to rate loyalty, particularly to the Commissioner, more highly than intelligent contribution to policy or operations. Argument, debate and openness to alternative views of what is happening is, some say, not prized as much as singing from the same hymn sheet.

Mick Keelty, it is said, did not much appreciate potential rivals, or even other police with media profiles. His team was tight and disciplined, and perhaps, in a somewhat military set-up, his system had its points. But it was inbred and not greatly open to new ideas, or very receptive to ideas that flow upwards from underneath the uncommonly thick layer of middle managers. Ambitious managers must respond simultaneously to a top-down culture from above, and the ordinary problems of an active force driven mostly by events and incidents completely out of AFP control. At operational levels, life is rather more democratic, and the difference is, insiders say, very marked and beginning to seriously affect morale.

So, I am being repeatedly told by AFP insiders, is a widespread belief among operational police that those who are anointed in the senior system are subject to different principles of accountability and control, entirely out of step with the standards expected of ordinary officers.

Police at almost all levels hear stories and gossip with each other about almost everything that senior officers do or are said to have done. They weigh those actions against the rules governing the activities of ordinary police. They sometimes assume motives that may not exist. It is almost immaterial whether some of the many stories in circulation are true, or entirely true – though some certainly are. What comes to matter rather more is the fact that they are generally believed. Some senior officers are thought untouchable – beyond accountability. Not only does this impression seriously affect morale, but it also affects the self-belief and detachment of officers expected and wanted to do the right thing by instinct.

Just as significantly, some of those with grievances against the system, or against particular officers, are waiting expectantly for a change of command, in the hope that they can confidently approach the guardians of some of the checks and balances within the system which have been supposed to exist but which seem, according to some informants, to be in suspense. It is not clear whether this is because managers are seen, rightly or wrongly, as being a part of the problem, or because of a fear of intervention from more senior officers.

Tony Negus, as the man at the top, might be administratively accountable for the fact of some suspicions, even if there were no actual criticisms of his own behaviour. Top bureaucrats, and AFP commissioners are usually more bureaucrats than cops, have often had to wear responsibility for things they didn't know, and haven't done.

But he himself became the subject of criticism when his son, who had become a police recruit, was involved in a traffic accident, and Negus insisted on attending an interview conducted by investigating police. The son was injured in the accident, but was allowed to be sworn in. Later he was allowed to resign, which an effect taking him out of internal police discipline. The whole affair attracted publicity, and Negus vehemently denied any wrongdoing or intervention on his son's behalf. But his critics are far from satisfied that the son was treated no differently from any other recruit in trouble, or that allegations about his driving were investigated as thoroughly as they would have been had he been an ordinary member of the public, let alone a would-be police officer.

In 40 years of reporting bureaucracies, including police forces, I have seen any number of occasions in which there have been allegations of partial treatment of friends and relations of people high up in organisations. Some prove quite unfounded. Sometimes, perfectly innocent acts – or acts going no higher than the ordinary expressions of concern that any parent might feel about a child in trouble – are misinterpreted, and become themselves additional elements in the gossip network.

My experience is that the problems do not go away because of simple denials, ignoring them, or their being investigated by some tame and safe official. And it is very unusual, particularly in the police, to find a successful case of hushing a matter up if a number of officers have been involved. Police talk to each other, and, in my experience, also to court staff, others in the law enforcement community and friends. Beyond mere gossip, it is quite usual that every single line officer, and, often, every single person in the chain of command up to (but not including) the senior executive, will write a contemporaneous note of exactly what occurred, and what each was told to do. That is done not for the purpose of blackmail, but for self-protection, particularly when faith in the overall integrity of administration is low. Some cynics think, anyway, that if a scandal is unearthed, a junior officer will be blamed for failing to complain or do his duty, and that superiors will blandly deny involvement.

The ''you are with me or against me'' culture of command is common enough in the public service, where, these days, some seniors tend to travel with ''their'' own teams. But where it has prevailed for a long time, it is usually best to have it followed by a completely different style of management.

The measure of a remaining discipline might be that internal complaints have not gone to the Ombudsman or to the Australian Commission for Law Enforcement Integrity, but that might be no more than a lack of faith in how those systems work. Rather more concerning is the appearance of a want of autonomous action by internal systems designed to protect the integrity of the system.

But it is not only Negus himself whose actions have caused a good deal of gossip. In recent times, I have been told of embarrassments and complications – even diplomatic consequences – caused by the termination of an affair between two senior officers. There has been a good deal of internal comment about a number of recent retirements/redundancies, again with questions about equal treatment. Some say, or hope, that the professional standards unit of the AFP is awaiting a number of departures so that it can progress some frozen investigations.

Here's what one anonymous officer, whose information seems to check out, says: ''Senior members of the AFP ... have been allowed to do what they want, when they want, without ever being called to justify their behaviour or actions. The egos and power that these individuals wield with the agency is second to none.

''If stories are broken by the media, the AFP will issue a nondescript media release, before ignoring any and all correspondence relating to the story from that point on.

''When inquiries are made by media outlets directly to the AFP, they will deny that documents or evidence exists.

''When requests for information are made under the FOI Act, the AFP will drag out the time for compliance, before redacting the information that they do not want anyone to get, despite no reasoning existing for doing so.

''I am ashamed that the agency ... holds its lower ranks to strict standards of behaviour, whilst [some of] those within positions of power will do whatever is necessary to cover their non-compliance. This, I believe, is one of the reasons that morale is at an all-time low, which has led to a number (above 10 per cent) of employees applying for voluntary redundancies.'''

This is an organisation in need of a new style of management, probably accompanied by searching but independent external review.