Highlights
- Prime Minister Morrison says this budget is about addressing all the cost-of-living pressures being faced by Australian families.
- The government is expected to temporarily reduce fuel excise - currently set at 44.2 cents per litre - in the budget to try and ease that pressure.
- The government is extending its home guarantee scheme, which allows eligible buyers to purchase a property with a deposit of just five per cent, instead of the usual ten per cent.
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Prime Minister Scott Morrison started pushing his pre-budget pitch at the under-construction Western Sydney Airport.
He marked the start of construction of the international runway at Sydney's long-awaited second major airport by talking up the government's commitment to infrastructure in what will be a key battleground area at the forthcoming federal election.
"Around half of the jobs here at Western Sydney Airport are from western Sydney. People in western Sydney are building this airport. We make things here in western Sydney. And, as Melissa McIntosh and I often say, and Sarah Richards, and the whole team out here in western Sydney, we make things, we manufacture things, and we build things. And we build big things, says Prime Minister Morrison.
The government is pledging nearly $18 billion for projects across every state and territory. That's on top of more than $110 billion in previous infrastructure funding pledges.
However the opposition is skeptical, and the man who's aiming to take his job in the next two months, Opposition leader Anthony Albanese, says what's happening now is a symptom of longer-term problems.
"Cost of living is about your income in, and then your costs out. The problem here is that the costs out have been going up, and the income is through people's wages, has been going down."
