$2.5m to return asylum seekers to Indonesia

The Abbott government has spent $2.5 million on an unknown number of disposable life boats to send asylum seekers back to Indonesia.

Border protection authorities purchased the life boats by piggy backing on existing government contract tenders, Customs and Border Protection chief Mike Pezzullo told a Senate estimates hearing in Canberra on Tuesday.

The money was allocated in the mid-year budget review, released in December.

Mr Pezzullo would not say how many life boats had been purchased.