Senator Bill Heffernan has verbally abused a number of women over the years both in his political party and now Julia Gillard.

There is absolutely NO excuse for same.

Either Mr Howard sacks him or Mr Howard is equally culpable

Or would Mr Howard accept a Labor MP saying anything similar about Minister Julie Bishop? Of course he never would.

The government runs TV ads against physical AND verbal violence against women.

They have a chance in their own back yard to put up.

It would be a good idea for Ms Gillard to go to. It wasn't to long ago that she was a staunch supporter of Mr Latham. I did not hear her speaking up when Mr Latham would let fly with many of his outbursts.

It's true that Julia has a touch of the Mark Lathams about her and can sometimes put her foot in her mouth, but Heffernan should get back in his Time Machine and go back to the 14th Century where he belongs.

What seems to have been missed in this debate is the element of truth in the comments - pollies on large incomes and perk packages are unlikely to relate well to average families. Now lets have a few more pollies focussing on that rather than the number of children someone has.

R0bert

I would have thought that not having children in her position would be an asset, allowing her to devote the necessary time to her job.

Bill is a dill.The Coalition had Julia Gillard on the ropes and Bill rings the bell before the end of the round throwing her refreshments and a reprieve.

Stupidity and poor judgement seems to be a political disease at the moment.Ego seems to get the better of most of us,especially those who hold the reigns of power too long.What must they be saying in private?