An Australian aid worker in Lebanon says Immigration Minister Peter Dutton should revisit the country's refugee camps following his comments about asylum seeker literacy levels.

Space to play or pause, M to mute, left and right arrows to seek, up and down arrows for volume. Watch Duration: 7 minutes 46 seconds 7 m Interview: Luciano Calestini, UNICEF Staffer

Mr Dutton has voiced concern that many refugees seeking humanitarian visas were illiterate in their own language and "large percentages of them have no English skills at all".

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull backed the comments, saying those seeking humanitarian visas are from "shattered areas of the world".

Luciano Calestini is UNICEF's deputy representative in Lebanon, where there are an estimated 1.5 million Syrian refugees.

Mr Calestini has helped some of those refugees gain humanitarian visas for Australia, including a disabled mother and daughter who managed to escape the Islamic State stronghold of Raqqa.

He told Lateline Mr Dutton's comments were appalling and do nothing but vilify vulnerable people.

"[Mr Dutton] was actually here in Lebanon just some six months ago, met with UNICEF, met with UNHCR, met with some government officials," he said.

"I do wonder if he needs to take a trip back, because perhaps he wasn't paying as much attention as he should have when he was here."

Mr Dutton visited Lebanon and Jordan in November, meeting with Syrian refugees as the Government announced its program to take in 12,000 people on humanitarian visas.

It was a trip Mr Dutton described as "confronting", saying the innocent child victims "pull at your heartstrings".

Mr Calestini said evidence showed that over time refugees were a net gain to a country's economy.

"What is true is that in the early years obviously an investment needs to be made to ensure that people are able to operate in the language of the country that they've been resettled to, that they have access to vocational training opportunities," he said.

"But once that investment is there, refugees actually outperform national averages more often than not."

Opposition Leader Bill Shorten earlier likened Mr Dutton to former One Nation leader Pauline Hanson, saying they are comments she "would have been proud to make".

The Opposition wants Australia's intake of refugees increased from 13,750 people to 27,000 in a decade.