Federal Attorney General George Brandis says he has never had a "cross word" with Solicitor-General Justin Gleeson, who complained that he was not consulted on important legal matters.  The rift between Australia's top two law enforcement figures has the opposition calling for Mr. Brandis' resignation.

Specifically, the Senate is investigating Brandis' decision to require his approval for all government requests for the Solicitor-General's advice, even if that request comes from the Prime Minister.  The Attorney-General says he discussed it with Mr. Gleeson in an hour-long meeting.  But that directly contradicts Gleeson's written submission to the Senate:

"At no time at that meeting did the Attorney-General indicate that he was considering issuing either a legally binding direction concerning the performance of the functions of the solicitor-general or a requirement that a Commonwealth person or body could only approach the solicitor-general for advice after receiving the Attorney-General's advance approval," Mr. Gleeson wrote.

"At no time at that meeting was there a discussion of restricting access to the solicitor-general to give legal advice," Gleeson added.  "It is critically important that persons such as the Governor-General, Prime Minister and officers of Parliament are able to approach the solicitor-general for advice in an uninhibited fashion."

Gleeson also says he was not consulted on proposed major changes to the law, such as the coalition's idea to strip Australian citizenship from dual-nationals involved with international terrorism.

The Federal opposition accuses Brandis of misleading Parliament, and wants him to resign.

"He's lied to the Senate, he's lied to the Australian people," said the shadow Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus, "It's a disgraceful act by the Attorney-General and he should be resigning."

If not, then Mr. Dreyfuss recommends that Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull "should sack him".