Former prime minister Tony Abbott has been criticised for a "tasteless" tribute to Bob Hawke, who he described as having a "Labor heart but a Liberal head".
Hawke died aged 89 last night, and Mr Abbott posted a statement describing Hawke as "Labor's greatest prime minister" but in the following sentence took a swipe at his political opponents.
"But his key achievements — financial deregulation, tariffs cuts, and the beginnings of privatisation — went against the Labor grain, as Labor's more recent policy direction shows," his statement read.