Labor ups boat claim rhetoric

Federal Labor has likened paying people smugglers to turn around their boats to paying murderers and drug dealers to not commit crimes.

"The allegation that we have is the equivalent of paying drug dealers not to make ice ... murderers to not go out and murder," opposition immigration spokesman Richard Marles told reporters in Canberra on Thursday.

He conceded Australian authorities pay informants to infiltrate criminal networks, but insisted it was very different to asking for "reverse people smuggling".