Empowerment of individuals and communities is absolutely central. Getting the community involved in organising their own destiny has got to be a key part of it.

For every dollar spent on early child development you save $7 over the life course because children with better early child development are less likely to end up delinquent, involved in crime, unemployed and so on.

... social environment in childhood affects achieved adult height, life chances, and ultimately mortality rates in adult life. (...) ... social circumstances acting in childhood do have a persisting effect on adult disease rates, in addition to influences acting in adulthood.

I don't blame people for smoking when I see a social gradient in smoking. I say we need to understand why is it the lower you are in the hierarchy the more likely you are to smoke. So we need to address the causes of the causes.

Empowerment of individuals and communities is absolutely central. Getting the community involved in organising their own destiny has got to be a key part of it.

If people want me to go round and talk to governments and others then I feel that responsibility which is why I am on the road a good deal of the time and why I'm not slowing down.

The differences between Indigenous and not Indigenous Australians can be easily attributed not to differences in their genes but to differences in the conditions in which they're born, grow, live, work and age - in other words, to the social determinants of health.