'Bottomless well of self-pity': Morrison savaged over robodebt response

“The purpose of that statement was to frame himself as the real victim of the robodebt royal commission,” Shorten told question time on Tuesday.

“The Member for Cook (Morrison) said, and I quote, that in making their finding, the commission sought to reverse the onus of proof to establish their claim.

“Satire is truly dead in this country, when the Member for Cook complains about the reversal of onus of proof on him, but not the 434,000 people who did have their reverse onus.

“And the Member for Cook then said the royal commission was a quasi-legal process, a new Morrisonian doctrine about the law.

“The royal commission was not quasi-legal.

“It’s real. It was constituted by the law. Forty-six days of public hearings, over 100 witnesses under oath…

“The victims of robodebt never had their legal costs paid for. Never had the chance to see the evidence put against them.

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“The Member for Cook is a bottomless well of self-pity and not a drop of mercy for all of the real victims of robodebt.”

Morrison was seen shaking his head during Shorten’s address and appeared to say “here we go” when he was first mentioned.

On Monday, the former prime minister expressed his “deep regret” for robodebt’s impact on millions of welfare recipients, but continued to label any findings against him as ”disproportionate, wrong, unsubstantiated and contradicted by clear evidence”.

“As minister for social services, I played no role and had no responsibility in the operation nor administration of the robodebt scheme,” he said.

He added that he “completely rejects each of the adverse findings against me in the commission’s report as unfounded and wrong”.