Department of Veterans’ Affairs officials only learnt second-hand that a program to address polypharmacy among veterans had lost ethics approval, its secretary has told a Senate committee.

The Veterans’ Medicines Advice and Therapeutic Education Services (MATES) program was axed on 12 February after the department’s independent Human Research Ethics Committee withdrew ethics approval for the University of SA–run project.

Two days later, officials were forced to defend the program under questioning from independent Senator Jacqui Lambie and Nationals deputy leader Senator Perin Davey last week.

The backlash to the program began after what officials called an “an administrative error”, which meant one veteran’s repeated requests to opt out of the program were ignored for five years.