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Last year the National Sorry Day Committee consulted with stolen generations people in every State and Territory, and concluded that programmes set up in response to the Bringing Them Home Report are reaching only a small fraction of those they are intended to help.

Well, I think indigenous peoples have ways of living on the Earth that they've had forever. And they've been overrun by organized religion, which has had a lot of money and power.

I think we have to keep working enormously hard to see that every single Indigenous child - every Australian child - has true equality of opportunity. We've got to work harder at it. I think, you know, the heartland issue for us is the gap; the gap in life expectancy in this country.

If people can't acknowledge the wisdom of indigenous cultures, then that's their loss.

Solutions will not be found while Indigenous people are treated as victims for whom someone else must find solutions.

What I would like to see is sufficiently good education and health services being delivered to Aboriginal people so that they are prepared and ready to leave and join the economic mainstream if that's their choice.

Yet there are thousands of Indigenous people searching for family members.

I am deeply committed to the cause of Indigenous Australians, and not just because of the Apology, but the big challenges which lie ahead in closing the gap.

Over 120 Aboriginal communities run their own health services - some have been doing so for 30 years. They struggle with difficult medical problems. They also try to deal with counselling, stolen generations issues, family relationships, violence, suicide prevention.