The man, believed to be in his 20s and previously living in Melbourne, made the attempt at about 8pm local time on Friday.

It is understood he was a criminal deportee staying at the centre's White Two high security compound.

Refugee Action Coalition spokesman Ian Rintoul said he believed it was the man's third suicide attempt in 10 days.

"You have a punitive regime [at the White compound] that is reminiscent of a penal colony," he said.

"The kind of brutality, the kind of submission and the kind of disciplinary [tactics] that are dealt out... it simply beggars belief."

Mr Rintoul said the man had lost a lot of blood, but the centre's officers had since taken him out of the compound and his condition was unknown.

The Immigration Department confirmed a "self-harm incident" had occurred at the North West Point Immigration Centre on Friday evening.

"The detainee is receiving appropriate medical and mental health support and care," a spokeswoman said.

She would not comment on the man's condition or where he had been transferred.

"It would be inappropriate to go into further detail about the incident or the individual circumstances of the detainee," she said.

Mr Rintoul said the detention centre was in lock down after the incident.

He said he believed the man was transferred from Melbourne about five months ago, but did not know what crime he had committed.

"Frankly, I think it's immaterial," he said.

"People can be 501s (criminal deportees) for a whole range of misdemeanours.

"The migration system allows for an extrajudicial form of punishment because people may be migrants or they may be asylum seekers or refugees."

Under section 501 of the Migration Act, a non-Australian citizen's visa may be cancelled and the person extradited or held in detention for a number of reasons, including failing a character test or receiving a jail term of at least one year.

Mr Rintoul said the incident came two days after an Iraqi asylum seeker sliced his hand in a self-harm incident at the centre.

"Detention centres are not the places where people can get real support, real treatment for mental health difficulties that plague [them]," he said.

Mr Rintoul called the conditions in the facility "inhuman" and not congruent with the criminal justice system.

"There needs to be a proper investigation," he said.

Greens Senator Sarah Hanson-Young said Australia's detention centres had "disintegrated into camps of despair".

"The latest spike of attempted suicides and serious self-harm requires an urgent and independent review of the health and welfare services of all detention facilities," she said.

"This review must be across all detention facilities, including an audit of the mental healthcare and status of each and every person detained, including, of course, children and minors."

A spokesman for Secro, which manages the facility, said the private company would not comment and referred the matter to the department.

Immigration Minister Peter Dutton's office did not respond to Fairfax Media's calls.

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