Labor and the Greens are staring down the Treasurer's warnings of a $1 trillion debt blowout, demanding Scott Morrison stop targeting the poor.
The Treasurer has warned of a $1 trillion debt blowout in the next decade should the new parliament fail to back his budget savings measures, insisting there is a new divide between "the taxed and the taxed-nots".
"What he didn't really mention was the taxed and the tax avoiders," Greens leader Richard Di Natale told ABC radio on Friday.
"There are ways to do this without hurting the poor."
Senator Di Natale and senior Labor figure Anthony Albanese said the government should instead be targeting negative gearing.
The government had conceded there were "excesses" when it came to negative gearing and yet was not prepared to do anything about it, Mr Albanese said.
"What we won't support is just hitting those people who are most vulnerable, while leaving intact the big end of town," Mr Albanese told the Nine Network.
The government needed to stop "hiding" the legislation from Labor if it wanted the opposition's support.
"People are sick of hyper partisanship," he said.
Cabinet minister Christopher Pyne insists Labor already knows what is in the government's savings bill, which has $6.5 billion in savings, because it includes policies Labor took to the election.
"Labor needs to vote for that if they're going to have any credibility on the economy at all."
With parliament set to start on Tuesday, former prime minister Tony Abbott told a business forum in Melbourne Labor needed to return to the "ethos of Hawke and Keating" and work with the government on economic security just as it had on national security.
He said the restoration of the Australian Building and Construction Commission - one of the triggers for the double dissolution election, which will be brought back to parliament next week - was a key economic reform which would deliver billions of dollars in investment.
"The very best way for the new parliament to support decent workers and hard-working small businesses is swiftly to pass the ABCC bill," Mr Abbott said.
He said the ABCC policy, which Labor and the Greens oppose but could pass if supported by nine crossbenchers, had been taken to three elections in a row and should be the "least politically difficult reform of all" to deliver.
One of the big unknowns is the fate of the government's proposed budget savings through reining in superannuation concessions. Coalition talks are expected next week with Labor, the Greens and crossbench senators.
Senator Di Natale said Mr Turnbull should not cave in to the "hard right" in his party.
"If they keep watering them down ... we won't support them," he said.
