Top 33 Jay Weatherill Quotes

A stronger focus on quality public policymaking and less distraction of personalities would be a sufficient and important contribution I can make.

South Australia has transformed. There has been a range of changes to our economy over the past 10 years in which we have genuinely set ourselves up for the future. I think we have to start behaving like that’s real and project a quiet confidence in the future of our state.

What we are trying to do is to look at all of those resources and say, well, would they be better spent on just advocacy and information, or can we make savings out of that and redirect them into savings.

I think the truth of it is that when you get down to actually having to do the things on the ground, there is only one way to do it, and that’s in cooperation with the communities.

Every user of the river down here understands that a healthy river is absolutely vital for a healthy economy and a healthy tourism industry.

Obviously any export of uranium to India could only occur within an appropriate international framework to be negotiated by the commonwealth government.

By and large we have got to find the good leaders to work with to make sure that we build the strength in these communities. Simply issuing edicts from Canberra isn’t going to solve issues on the APY lands.

We are all in this together. We want to have, I suppose, a single point of entry so that anyone coming near a disability service can get a very complete picture. Government needs to understand that picture, and we need to be able to offer somebody a one-stop shop.

I’ve decided to lead in a way that takes people with me. It’s the approach that I think will stand not only our party but also our state in good stead.

Well, there are different levels of love.

People want the freedom. They want to be able to shop. If you don’t like the shop trading hours and you’re a shop owner, you don’t have to open.

Everybody has to make their own decisions about how they choose to behave.

I believe that investing in our children’s development from the earliest age is the single most important contribution we can make to the health and wellbeing of our citizens, their capacity and the future prosperity of our state.

I want to make sure we are presenting to the South Australian people a Government that is open and accountable. I want to make sure that we maintain public confidence in government at all levels.

Civility is perhaps a quaint notion but civility in Parliament is something we should always strive to uphold.

I think there is a case for strong action and intervention when there is criminality and when the leaders are corrupt or behaving in a criminal fashion.

Our job as a government is to start with the great underpinnings of our current economic growth – particularly defence and mining – and build on these.

I think we all share a view about wanting to make sure we have a healthy river and we’re looking forward to the plan and in the lead-up to that we’ve agreed to speak again.

I don’t think the AAA is an end in itself; we will maintain prudent financial management with or without the AAA.

One thing we do know about the threat of climate change is that the cost of adjustment only grows the longer it’s left unaddressed.

We may very well be faced with the choice of retaining the AAA credit rating or abandoning some of our key infrastructure projects, which are about jobs for the future. I will choose jobs in that equation every time.

Defence is our best attack.

My government, you can be assured, will be less focused on personalities. It is about treating people with respect. I think complaining about the community not being able to see the wisdom of our ideas is the wrong approach.

Grace Portolesi is a strong, assertive passionate young woman and she is precisely the sort of person I want in my cabinet and she will have a senior role.

There is an opportunity for us to renew ourselves. There’s an opportunity for us to leave the past behind and present something different for the future.

We have been getting ready to recycle more e-waste by investing in infrastructure, providing grants to local government and working with industry.

All the government decisions remain and won’t be altered until I get in the role and have had a chance to discuss them with my colleagues.

If you present good government, then elections look after themselves.

If we wish our state’s growth to continue, then our future will increasingly be with industries that require a highly skilled and technically proficient workforce.

You don’t get unity by ignoring the questions that have to be faced.

We need to get back to the concept of taking the community with us.

I have learned to not worry about things I can’t control.

We will also have a more rigorous approach to professional development and managing unsatisfactory performance.