There may not be a great job for [Aboriginal people] but whatever there is, they just have to do it, and if it’s picking up rubbish around the community, it just has to be done.

I've always been very wary of debates involving women.

Part of my role, I suppose, is to run government business in the House of Representatives, and try to ensure that people know exactly what's going on in the Chamber is an important part of that.

The problem with politicians getting to know the issues in indigenous townships is that we tend to suffer from what Aboriginal people call the 'seagull syndrome' - we fly in, scratch around and fly out.

I'm a politician. I'm not going to get into a whole range of scientific argument with scientists.

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

There'll be some savings from preventing double dipping by public servants which are currently able to access not one but two fully tax payer funded schemes and of course there will be out paid parental leave levy. So all up not only is this an important economic reform, an important reform to have to grow our economy more strongly, it also will leave the budget better off which will help us fix the mess that Labor has created with the budget.