Australians are coffee snobs. An influx of Italian immigrants after World War II ensured that - we probably had the word 'cappuccino' about 20 years before America. Cafe culture is really big for Aussies. We like to work hard but we take our leisure time seriously.

Although I'm Australian I find myself much more in sympathy with the Austrian version!

I'm in total sympathy with Dick Smith's sentiments I only wish there were grounds for saying we Australians would never tolerate such appalling treatment of refugees being carried out in our name.

I had a vocal coach. It's a sad thing but I had to hire someone so that I could get my Australian accent back.

The coal industry is an even larger part of the Australian economy than it is of the American and it has an enormous amount of political power.

Well Australia's been in Afghanistan from the get go way back in 2001 but we have been resolute throughout and with support from both sides of Australian politics.

I will go to the next election saying to Australians vote for me vote for the Liberal Party and I will become your PM. So I'm offering myself as the alternative PM - that's one way people describe the Leader of the Opposition - but I'm not in politics for myself to realize a personal ambition.

I started off in England and very few people knew I was Australian. I mean the clues were in the poems but they didn't read them very carefully and so for years and years I was considered completely part of the English poetry scene.

My commitment to the Republican movement was pure and simply patriotism a love of Australia... a desire or passion that all of our national symbols should be unequivocally and unambiguously Australian.

On the same line of reasoning if Australians were to be Australians or rather if Australians were as separate from any other nation as Australia from any other land there would be no jealousy between them on England's account.

Well it's a - I don't want to disappoint you but it's a time worn tradition of Australian Governments over many years not to get into any discussion about that aspect of intelligence matters.

You know I'm Australian and we have got the worst sense of humor. We are cruel to each other.

Health economists have estimated that an injection of $250 million per year in Indigenous clinical care and $50 million in preventative care is required to provide services at the same level as for any other group with the health conditions of Indigenous Australians.

Advances in science and medical research and public health policies have meant that life expectancy for Australians is one of the highest in the world.

If the states and territories do not sign up to fundamental reform then my message is equally simple: we will take this reform plan to the people at the next election - along with a referendum by or at that same election to give the Australian Government all the power it needs to reform the health system.

Both my parents are English and came out to Australia in 1967. I was born the following year. My parents and immigrants like them were known as '£10 poms.' Back then the Australian government was trying to get educated British people and Canadians - to be honest educated white people - to come and live in Australia.

On Australia Day 2010 as we enter this second decade of the 21st century Australians can be optimistic about our future but we cannot afford to mistake optimism for complacency.

The Australian Government's decision to take on the dominant funding role for the entire public hospital system is designed to: end the blame game eliminate waste and to shoulder the funding burden of the rapidly rising health costs of the future.

Because the time has come well and truly come for all peoples of our great country for all citizens of our great commonwealth for all Australians - those who are indigenous and those who are not - to come together to reconcile and together build a new future for our nation.

I deeply believe that if the Australian Labor Party a party of which I have been a proud member for more than 30 years is to have the best future for our nation then it must change fundamentally its culture and to end the power of faceless men. Australia must be governed by the people not by the factions.

I love food all types of food. I love Korean food Japanese Italian French. In Australia we don't have a distinctive Australian food so we have food from everywhere all around the world. We're very multicultural so we grew up with lots of different types of food.

I think Australian food is probably some of the best in the world.

Now both my films have been number one at the Australian box office and it took about two years just to get the finance for this film so if it's hard for me then God help everyone else.

These are important reforms. Infrastructure education health hospitals closing the gap with indigenous Australians. Also the Apology to the first Australians. As Prime Minister of the country I am proud of each and every one of these achievements.