Even as police were still on the scene of yet another American school shooting – the 74th since the massacre of primary school children in Newtown – President Barack Obama praised Australia’s gun laws in an online question and answer session.

“Couple of decades ago, Australia had a mass shooting, similar to Columbine or Newtown. And Australia just said, well, that’s it, we’re not doing, we’re not seeing that again, and basically imposed very severe, tough gun laws, and they haven’t had a mass shooting since,” said the president in a pre-arranged session held to discuss his plans to help cut student debt.

“Our levels of gun violence are off the charts. There’s no advanced, developed country that would put up with this.”

He said he was stunned that Congress had not managed to pass laws on new regulations after the Newtown massacre in 2012.