What will most certainly happen is that there will be very clear and full communication between the government and independents and minor parties. The precise mechanisms will evolve over time, but we certainly intend to keep the minor parties and the independents very much in the loop. We have to if we want our legislative agenda to have a reasonable chance of success and that's what we intend to do.

I don't think my religious convictions should be held against me.

Here we go again, a government which is making yet more excuses for yet more failure when it comes to getting our budgetary situation right.

If you want to put a price on carbon why not just do it with a simple tax?

The Australian public are very fair and they are always prepared to give the leader of a major political party a fair go.

I would not want to see any relaxation of the law prohibiting human cloning.

If I was in a refugee camp somewhere on the Pakistani border, of course I'd want to come to Australia.