Julia Gillard has defended her department spending almost $1 million on three "happiness" conferences for public servants and teachers last month.

Opposition frontbencher Tony Abbott has branded Kevin Rudd "the worst parliamentary performer as Prime Minister since Billy McMahon" as the Government and Opposition continue to spar over their respective performances in Federal Parliament.

Speaking to Sky News this morning, Mr Abbott was on the attack over Mr Rudd's parliamentary style.

"The guy is a toxic bore in the Parliament, and thank God you [Labor] have got [Julia] Gillard there," he said.

“The legacy of the former Liberal government is one that we should all want to own.

“There's no doubt this is difficult, dangerous, complex, and it's going to be a long haul contribution. There's no doubt about that.

But when we first came to office over a year ago we sat down and we very carefully went through whether we believe our ongoing contribution in Afghanistan was in our national interest.

We came strongly to the conclusion that Afghanistan, the Afghanistan Pakistan border area, is currently, regrettably, the hotbed of international terrorism.