Former prime minister Tony Abbott has conceded that the Coalition opposition might have erred in not supporting the Gillard government’s Malaysian solution to the asylum-seeker crisis of 2011.
Delivering a speech to the Samuel Griffith Society, in Adelaide, said allowing the Malaysian solution “would have been a step back from the hyper-partisanship that now poisons our public life”.
Abbott conceded his government could have handled differently the debate over repealing Section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act.
Abbott also discussed budget repair and his government’s economic policies during 2013-15.