Prime Minister Tony Abbott is under pressure to confirm or deny claims that people smugglers have been given cash incentives to turn back boats.
Mr Abbott is refusing to comment on allegations six crew members of a boat, carrying 65 asylum seekers from Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Myanmar, were each paid $US5000 after being intercepted by Australian border protection personnel.
Indonesian authorities are investigating the claims.
Smugglers can't have floating ATM: Labor
Labor is demanding Prime Minister Tony Abbott tell the truth about claims Customs officials have paid people smugglers cash to turn back their boats.
"The Australian people need to know whether or not our government is paying people smugglers, because if they are, that is a very dangerous development indeed," opposition immigration spokesman Richard Marles told reporters in Sydney on Friday.
He said people smugglers should face the full force of the law and not turn up beside an Australian Navy vessel and find themselves next to "a floating ATM" and be presented with a taxpayer funded cheque.
Greens demand answers on boat 'pay-offs'
The Australian Greens are demanding the prime minister be straight with the public and confirm if Customs officials have been handing out cash to turn back asylum seeker boats.
Immigration spokeswoman Sarah Hanson-Young says it's laughable Tony Abbott is arguing details are being withheld on operational grounds.
"Either this happened or it didn't," she told reporters in Adelaide on Friday, adding there were questions about whether a crime had been committed.
Prime Minister Tony Abbott insists Australia will do whatever it takes to stop people smugglers amid claims they have been given cash incentives by Customs officials to turn back boats.
"What we do is we stop the boats by hook or by crook," he told Radio 3AW on Friday.
"We have stopped the trade and we will do what we have to do to ensure that it stays stopped."
Indonesian authorities are investigating allegations Customs officials paid $US5000 to the six crew members of a boat carrying 65 people from Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Myanmar, bound for New Zealand late in June.
The boat was turned around and sent back to the Indonesian island of Rote.
The asylum seekers, including women and children who are being housed in a small hotel in the eastern Indonesian city of Kupang, have corroborated the account given by the crew.
Local police chief Hidayat, who like many Indonesians goes by one name, said an Australian police officer and a New Zealand police officer spoke with the boat people in Kupang on Wednesday, and planned to interview the captain and crew on the island of Rote.
The officers were expected to travel to the point where the boat was intercepted to determine whether it was in Australian or international waters.
Mr Abbott repeatedly refused to confirm whether Australia was investigating the claims, saying the government did not comment on operational matters.
"But we are determined to ensure that illegal boats don't get to Australia," he said.
"We will do whatever is reasonably necessary to protect our country from people smuggling."
Indonesian foreign ministry information director general Esti Andayani said the allegations were worrying.
"We are concerned it will inspire people to do it (take asylum seekers on boats) because they'll get money," she told AAP in Bandung.
