West Australian police say a trio assaulted Ninette Simmons, 73, and her 76-year-old husband Philip, alleging his hands were tied behind his back while they stole $200,000 in jewellery.

One of the alleged perpetrators was part of a cohort of immigration detainees at the centre of a federal political fight.

The 43-year-old man was one of 154 men released from immigration detention in November after the High Court ruled indefinite detention was unlawful.

Noting he was limited in what he could say about a case before the court, Immigration Minister Andrew Giles said he spoke to the WA police minister about the case.

“How we can better support the victims, including if they wish to speak to me directly to reiterate that’s something that I’m very keen to do … if that’s something that’s of interest to them,” he told ABC radio on Tuesday.

The opposition has seized on the alleged attack to slam the government for not monitoring the released cohort more closely or applying to have any of them put back behind bars under emergency powers that passed parliament late last year.

“I want to see the prime minister sack the two ministers responsible for this dreadful circumstance,” Opposition Leader Peter Dutton said.

Mr Giles hit back, accusing the opposition leader of disrespecting the rule of law, highlighting that the government opposed the High Court decision that released the detainees and had to abide by the ruling.

“He’s misleading the Australian people,” he said.

The government has been given the power to apply to put a detainee back behind bars, even if they hadn’t yet committed a crime, if they are ruled to be too high a risk to community safety.

Opposition immigration spokesman Dan Tehan chastised the government for not applying for an order.

“The government has sat on its hands, not acted on this regime knowing that the chances of reoffending by these hardened criminals was high,” he told ABC TV.

Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles defended the amount of time it took to apply for an order, saying the less than five months since the legislation was put into place was shorter than the coalition used to apply for an order under a similar regime.

Mr Tehan argued the regimes were different.

While he couldn’t comment on individual applications so legal proceedings wouldn’t be prejudiced, “applications are well underway to respond to preventative detention for the most serious and violent offenders,” Mr Giles said.