The Northern Territory youth justice system is now the subject of a Royal Commission - a decision Tony Abbott said may have been made too quickly.
Both sides of government are now also focusing on broader change to foreign donations laws.
As Malcolm Turnbull prepares to spend the weekend in the tiny island chain of Micronesia, a former Prime Minister is stepping into the domestic void to criticise his leader.
Tony Abbott has told Sydney radio 2GB's Alan Jones that Malcolm Turnbull's snap decision to announce a Royal Commission into abuses in the Northern Territory youth justice system was premature.
"Governments normally need to pause and think before they take precipitate action. I'm confident this Royal Commission, given its terms of reference, will come up with a reasonable report. But you're right, Alan - normally governments should not respond in panic at TV programs."
But the former and current prime ministers are more closely aligned on changing political donations laws.
Mr Abbott has spoken to several media outlets to add his voice to calls to ban foreign political donors.
"It's not just a question of banning foreign donations, we ought to ban union donations, and while we're at it let's ban company donations as well. Donations to political parties should be from people on the electoral roll, that's a way of being as transparent and above-board as possible."
It's a similar position to the one Malcolm Turnbull voiced in Laos this week.
"Ideally, donations to political parties should be limited to people who are on the electoral roll, voters. So you would exclude not simply foreigners but you would exclude corporations and you'd exclude trade unions."
But Prime Minister Turnbull isn't calling for immediate change, seemingly content with claiming the scalp of Labor senator Sam Dastyari.
The New South Wales Senator was forced to resign from the Opposition frontbench this week after a history of donations from a company linked to China was revealed.
The Government claimed he'd been bought by China, and adopted a position which didn't match the Labor Party's on the South China Sea dispute.
Coalition frontbencher Christopher Pyne is also backing calls for change.
He spoke to Channel Nine.
"I would ban company and union donations and only have donations from individuals but you also have to do something about third-party campaigning otherwise the unions will simply give all their money to Get Up and use them to campaign against the Liberal party ... It's not as simple as everyone thinks it is."
But Labor's legal affairs spokesman, Mark Dreyfus, says the Prime Minister has given up changing donations laws.
"Mr Turnbull's only interest in donations is making them himself to his own party, to the tune of one or two million dollars. Perhaps it's three or four, we don't know and we won't know because the current donations rules mean we won't be told, there's no formal disclosure needed, until 18 months after a donation is made."
Professor Anne Twomey is a constitutional law expert from the University of Sydney.
She's told the ABC New South Wales has already tried to do what's being recommended nationally, and ban some donors.
"When (former premier) Barry O'Farrell tried to do what's currently being proposed - that's banning corporations and unions and the like from donation, and restricting it to people on the electoral roll - the High Court held that was unconstitutional. But in a later case, the High Court did uphold provisions that specifically banned property developers from donating because there was a legitimate reason for doing so, in relation to concerns about corruption."
Professor Twomey says it's possible that foreign donors could be banned without unconstitutionality, but extremely unlikely that local third-party donors, like corporations, unions or lobby groups, could be banned.
The Prime Minister will return to Canberra next week when Parliament resumes.
The sitting week will also mark 12 months since Malcolm Turnbull challenged and replaced Tony Abbott as Prime Minister.
