The number crunchers at Treasury and Finance finally get a chance to have their say about the budget and the economic outlook on Tuesday.
Every three years, under the Charter of Budget Honesty, the two departments are released from the shackles of government to issue their independent Pre-election Economic and Fiscal Outlook (PEFO).
The charter was set up by former Liberal treasurer Peter Costello to allow opposition parties to see a true assessment of the books without a political bent from the government at the time.
Shadow treasurer Joe Hockey had previously raised concerns about the timing of the release of the Rudd government's own budget update - released just over a week ago - and PEFO, saying he wouldn't trust the numbers or release his election costings on the back of them.
Finance Minister Penny Wong said Mr Hockey's excuses were "laughable".
"Currently their promises don't add up, they are running away from transparency and accountability and I don't think that is good enough for Australia," she told Sky News.
However, within hours there appeared to be a change of heart from Opposition Leader Tony Abbott.
"This government has got all of its figures wrong. It's never got a figure right, never got a forecast right," he said.
"The best estimate going will be PEFO. Hopefully it will be more accurate than previous figures and we'll obviously be working off the PEFO figures."
He again promised all of the coalition's policies will be properly costed and released in "good time before the election".
Still, it would seem unlikely that in the course of just over week there would be too much difference between PEFO and the government's economic statement.
If there is, the government will have a lot to answer for.
Its statement cut growth forecasts and increased unemployment expectations, while predicting more debt and larger deficits over the next three financial years than in May.
The opposition has pointed out that between the May budget and the economic statement deficits deteriorated by $3 billion a week in total.
The 2013/14 deficit is now expected to be $30.1 billion rather than the $18 billion predicted in May, while further forward a smaller $4 billion surplus is forecast for 2016/17.
Economists doubt there will be any surprises in PEFO's economic forecasts given the Reserve Bank's own independent updated outlook released separately on Friday was consistent with the government's economic statement.
That included a trimmed growth forecast of 2.5 per cent for 2013/14.
