Tony Abbott has been forced to slap down his shadow finance minister's talk of cuts to the foreign aid budget and the commonwealth public service.
During an address to the National Press Club on Wednesday, Senator Joyce raised the possibility of cuts to overseas aid and public servant jobs as ways to fund the coalition's new $3.2 billion direct action climate change policy.
On Thursday, Mr Abbott canned the ideas after doing a supermarket walkabout in the Canberra suburb of Ainslie to highlight how the government's emissions trading scheme would push up the cost of everyday grocery items.
"I want to be absolutely clear about this: the coalition supports existing plans for spending on foreign aid. The coalition supports the public service," Mr Abbott told reporters.
"I do want to make this point though, the Rudd government are masters of waste, we saw $17 million wasted in the failed broadband tender, we've obviously got the $13 million in the failed GroceryWatch scheme.
"To this government $3.2 billion is a rounding error."
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