The Taoiseach denied that he had visited an immigrant detention centre in Australia during heated exchanges with the Opposition.

Mr Ahern said he had no quarrel with media reports about his visit, "but I was not in a detention centre, I did not see a detention centre". Pressed by the Labour leader, Mr Ruairi Quinn, to say he if he was misquoted, the Taoiseach replied: "The only person who misquoted me at home and who turned it around was, of course, Deputy John Bruton."

He added that some of the Irish media, although not those travelling with him to Australia, had followed what Mr Bruton had to say. "They will know in future not to take their information from Fine Gael press statements because they know that now is wrong."

Asked by Mr Quinn if he had declined to rule out detention centres for immigrants, the Taoiseach replied: "I did not rule them out because at that stage I did not know what was involved in Australia's detention centres. If that question had been asked a few days later - when I realised there was a storm back home because the question mentioned detention centres - I would have known that, but I did not know and could not have known what was involved in Australia's detention centres.

"It was hours earlier when the matter hit the papers here on the morning of March 14th."

Mr Bruton asked: "Did the Taoiseach say to Katie Hannon of the Examiner that there is no question of anyone getting away from the centres until all the processes are gone through; it is something you have to look at; we have to look very hard at the system? Did the Taoiseach say that to Katie Hannon or not?

"Did he say to Geraldine Kennedy of The Irish Times that he was conscious that the Australian system is probably the best in the world for dealing with immigration? Did he say that or not?"

Mr Ahern replied: "As I have said, I have no argument with any of the comments reported in the newspapers. It is how one takes them and tries to twist them, and how one tries to put remarks that were made in one place in an entirely different location."

He added that he was observing an integration system, looking at language training and children who were being cared for. He was looking at a multicultural centre.

Mr Bruton remarked: "This is waffle."

Denying he was waffling, Mr Ahern said: "While I admire the deputy on some things, I did not admire the way in which, when I was on the other side of the world, he tried to undermine my position in an untruthful way. He knew where I was. He knew that I was not in a detention centre."

Mr Bruton said he knew what the Taoiseach had said in Australia was inflammatory.

"The Taoiseach has admitted that he spoke in approving terms of centres from which people could not get away, in a system of immigration control which he also described as the best in the world. That speaks for itself and no further comment is required."

Mr Ahern said the way people were dealt with in the integration service in Australia, of which he was speaking, was one of the best in the world.

"It is one we would find very hard to replicate."