Bill Shorten has rallied his Labor troops by claiming credit for the defeat of many of the controversial measures contained in last year's budget.
"We have most certainly fought for fairness for all Australians," the opposition leader told a meeting of the Labor caucus in Canberra on Tuesday, citing stalled indexation changes to the aged pension and the abandoned GP co-payment.
"Australians still, though, experience the calamitous and the shocking damage to the national confidence of the 2014 budget."
Mr Shorten likened Prime Minister Tony Abbott and Treasurer Joe Hockey to leopards unable to change their spots, saying they may change their tactics but the destination remains the same.
"A bleaker, meaner, narrower, more unequal society," he said.
Mr Shorten questioned the byword for the government's second budget - fairness.
"Fairness is not what you say one night in a year and it's not using a word count on a computer to see how many times it appears," he said.
To the cheers of his Labor colleagues, he said he was looking forward to taking up the fight against the 2015 budget.
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