Clive Palmer tells Tony Abbott to 'commit suicide' during his press conference about the tertiary education bill.

CLIVE Palmer has suggested the Prime Minister “commit suicide” over his treatment of universities, and he’s being slammed for it.

During a press conference at Parliament House on the Australian economy, the Palmer United Party leader was expressing his opposition to the government’s tertiary education deregulation plans.

“There’s a million students going to tertiary education in this country, there’s a million more that’s about to go, and a million more that’s just left, they’ve all got parents,” he said.

“So commit suicide Tony Abbott, you know.”

Mr Palmer started laughing as he made the comment, and a Guardian journalist questioned whether he thought it was a respectable thing to say.

Mr Palmer responded, trying to clarify he meant “political suicide”.

“I was raising it because it was suicide, political suicide, to go against the will of what’s good for the Australian people.”

He later took to Twitter to further clarify his comments, and offer an apology.

Today I inadvertently used the term suicide in regard to @TonyAbbottMHR when I meant political suicide. I apologise for any offence caused. — Clive Palmer (@CliveFPalmer) March 4, 2015

Not surprisingly, Clive is copping it on Twitter.

Clive Palmer knew what he was saying. What a disgraceful thing to say about the PM. Suicide is not a political plaything. #auspol — Brent Davidson (@Brentus88) March 4, 2015

Clive Palmer did what? Flippant suicide references are NOT cool. — June Northern (@junenorthern) March 4, 2015

Good on @danielhurstbne for pulling up Palmer on irresponsible comments re Abbott. — Osman Faruqi (@oz_f) March 4, 2015

For help or support in Australia, contact Lifeline on 13 11 14 or www.lifeline.org.au or the Suicide Call Back Service on 1300 659 467.