Tony Abbott calls for Malcolm Turnbull to come clean on immigration

Tony Abbott has accused the PM of being ‘tricky’ on the issue of immigration.

Tony Abbott has implored Malcolm Turnbull to speak the truth on immigration. Picture: AP

Tony Abbott has accused Malcolm Turnbull of making the government “look tricky” after the prime minister denied a report in The Australian that Peter Dutton held discussions with cabinet colleagues about cutting the migration intake.

Mr Abbott said he could not understand why Mr Turnbull and Foreign Minister Julie Bishop “got their knickers in a twist” over the story, saying it was the duty of a responsible government to examine migration settings.

“He’s (Mr Turnbull’s) made the government look tricky and that’s not what the government should appear to be, particularly when there is nothing wrong about having a discussion about bringing the immigration number down,” Mr Abbott told 2GB.

Mr Dutton, the Home Affairs Minister, today confirmed The Australian’s story that he discussed changing Australia’s immigration intake with his senior colleagues, saying he had “canvassed different options around the composition of the program”.

Taking aim at Mr Turnbull, Mr Abbott said the Prime Minister was being “very clever with words” by suggesting the issue was never formally discussed at the cabinet level.

“They’re saying it never went to cabinet, but that’s not to say that it hasn’t been discussed by cabinet ministers. And that, I suspect, is what Peter Dutton has been saying today. Of course it was discussed, but it may not have been a formal submission to either the cabinet or a sub committee of cabinet,” Mr Abbott told 2GB.

“I can’t understand why the foreign minister and the prime minister are so nervous about admitting that the government had a discussion about reducing immigration... You’d think that a sensible government would have been happy to discuss the rate of immigration.

“I would be absolutely flabbergasted if it hadn’t been raised given the reports in the paper, given what Peter Dutton said and given the careful word play on the part of both the foreign minister and the prime minister.

“I suspect the prime minister is being very careful with his words. I think that the lawyer in the prime minister has probably come out... He’s tried to speak very emphatically in denying something which he knows is substantially true.”

While Mr Dutton this morning said he supported Malcolm Turnbull’s denial of the story, he went on to confirm a lot of the story’s content.

The Australian revealed yesterday Mr Dutton proposed cutting Australia’s yearly maximum immigration intake from 190,000 to 170,000.

“Of course I support the comments of the Prime Minister,” Mr Dutton said.

“I’ll add to that though, because as you would expect, and as every immigration minister would have, I have canvassed different options around the composition of the program.

“We have huge surges, for example, in the number of international students coming through, which is a great thing for our economy. We have surges in the numbers of visitors coming through, which are both reflected in that figure.

“We need to talk more about the figures and the impact, the economic benefit of tourism, of those international visitors”.