Seventeen of Australia's detention centres will be closed, Immigration Minister Peter Dutton announced on Tuesday.

"We have worked tirelessly since the day we were first elected to make sure that we could keep the people smugglers out of business, to make sure we could close the detention centres," Mr Dutton said in question time.

"And I'm pleased to announce ahead of the budget tonight that we will close 17 detention centres, resulting in 17 detention centres having been open by Labor and 17 closed by this government," he said.

Mr Dutton did not reveal which detention centres would be shut down, or where the asylum seekers housed in the centres would be sent.

The minister repeated comments he made earlier on Tuesday, blaming refugee advocates, rather than his government's policies, for recent horrifying incidents of self-harm on Nauru.

A young Somali woman named Hadon set herself on fire on Monday. She was the second self-immolation at Nauru in the past week. The first was a 23-year-old Iranian man named Omid Masoumali, who died.

Hadon had been flown to Australia and remained "in a very serious, critical condition" Mr Dutton said during a press conference.

It is understood the young woman received treatment at the Republic of Nauru Hospital on Monday night before being flown to the Royal Brisbane and Women's Hospital burns unit on Tuesday morning.

Refugee Action Coalition spokesman Ian Rintoul said the woman was "badly burnt [and that] all her clothes have been burnt off".

They believe she was one of three refugees returned to Nauru last week after travelling to Australia for medical treatment, following head injuries suffered in a motorbike accident on the island.

Unconfirmed social media reports suggested the woman was on suicide watch in the Brisbane Immigration Transit Accommodation centre before being removed and forced back to Nauru. The Immigration Department has been asked to verify this.

Mr Dutton confirmed the woman had recently been in Australia for medical treatment but would not confirm if she had previously tried to commit suicide.

Mr Dutton expressed anger at advocates and others "who are encouraging some of these people to behave in a certain way, believing that that pressure exerted on the Australian Government will see a change in our policy in relation to our border protection measures".

"These behaviours have intensified in recent times and as we see, they have turned to extreme acts with terrible consequences," Mr Dutton said.

"Advocates who proclaim to represent and support the interests of refugees and asylum seekers must frankly hear a clear message ... their activities and these behaviours must end."

An additional eight health staff, including four mental health staff, were deployed to Nauru last week, Dutton said.
 
"This builds on the $11 million the Australian Government provided for the medical clinic at the Nauru [regional processing centre] and the $26.5 million we've provided to upgrade Nauru Hospital," he said.

Mr Dutton repeated his government's insistence that alleviating the plight of those at Nauru and Manus Island would inevitably lead to a flood of asylum seeker boats.

"No action [that] advocates or those in regional processing countries take will cause the government to deviate from its course," he said. "We are not going to allow people to drown at sea again."

Asked whether he believed self-harming refugees were mentally ill and desperate, rather than acting at the behest of advocates, Mr Dutton said they had "paid thousands of dollars to people smugglers to come to Australia and they haven't arrived in Australia. They are frustrated by that, I can understand that".

On Tuesday afternoon locals reported a small wooden boat filled with asylum seekers had made it to within 500 metres of the Cocos Islands, the first asylum seeker boat to be spotted near Australian territory in two years.

with Bianca Hall Jorge Branco 

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