Dozens of Immigration Department spin doctors are set to lose their special public service classification.

The "Public Affairs Officer" classification is to be consigned to history if the department's bosses get their way, but insiders have labelled the move a "disaster" for the public servants affected.

It is understood that the special legal and medical officer designations will be kept while the public affairs officers get "mainstreamed".

Immigration is one of the few Commonwealth departments to still have the specific job classification "public affairs officer", with more than 30 public servants holding the title as at June 2014.

The job has been politically charged since asylum seeker issues came to the fore of federal politics in the early 2000s and some of the clashes over the years between the department's spinners and the media have become the stuff of Canberra legend.

But the department, which has merged with Customs to create the 13,000-strong Department of Immigration and Border Protection, wants to make a few changes to the special designation of its media officers, as part of the current round of enterprise bargaining talks.

The public affairs officer structure is based on the APS classification structure but does provide local titles and separate salary ranges for public affairs officers, one of the department's spokesman told Fairfax.

Media units in Commonwealth departments have been a sensitive subject since Public Service Minister Eric Abetz, while in opposition in 2012, railed against the "battalion" of communications workers, at a time when their numbers hovered around the 1600 mark.

Fairfax Media revealed in March 2014 that the numbers had grown to at least 1900, costing up to $190 million a year.

The 2014 federal budget pledged to save $43 million over four years "streamlining" the bureaucracy's publicity efforts and each major department has been given a figure which it is expected to achieve but there is no indication that Immigration's move is related to the savings effort.

Public service bosses are often grilled during the Senate estimates process, about the number of spinners on their departments' books, by opposition politicians looking to embarrass the government

The Immigration spokesman confirmed the department wanted to bring the public affairs officers into the workplace mainstream.

"The proposed agreement will adopt the APS Classification Structure and salary ranges for public affairs roles," he said.

"Many employees performing public affairs roles in the department, including those who are former Customs and Border Protection employees, are already working outside of the formal PAO classification structure in the department.

"All existing PAOs have an equivalent APS Classification and will retain this on transition to the proposed enterprise agreement.

The spokesman said that none of the spinners would lose money through the change and some might even be on a financial winner.

"For most PAOs the proposed enterprise agreement contains salary ranges that are equivalent to or higher than what they are currently on," he said.

"A small number of employees have personal salaries that are above the proposed salary ranges. Salary for these employees will be preserved."

But a source close to the portfolio said there was a widespread impression that the move was financially motivated and that it would be a "disaster" for the public servants on the public affairs officer classification.

"That's a disaster for professional communicators whose skills, experience, counsel and specialisation is being disregarded for sake of saving a few bucks," the source said.