Anyone who thinks it's smart to cut immigration is sentencing Australia to poverty.

We are already experiencing the symptoms of climate change, especially with a hotter and drier climate in southern Australia - the rush to construct desalination plants is an expensive testament to that.

Mitt Romney speaking to a $50,000-a-plate Republican fundraiser says he doesn't have to worry about the 47 per cent of Americans who don't pay tax. He was not counting on the smart phone recording his speech and then posting it on YouTube.

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.

To the former child migrants, who came to Australia from a home far away, led to believe this land would be a new beginning, when only to find it was not a beginning, but an end, an end of innocence - we apologise and we are sorry. To the mothers who lost the maternal right to love and care for their child - we apologise, and we are sorry.

On balance, after weighing the arguments, I believe that the time has come for Australia to create a new sovereign wealth fund.