Federal Treasurer Wayne Swan is set to spend Wednesday selling the fact that his fifth budget transplants the profits from the mining boom straight back to working Australian families.
As promised, the government delivered a wafer-thin $1.5 billion surplus in Tuesday’s budget, a turnaround from the $44 billion deficit in 2011/12.
It is Labor’s first surplus budget in 20 years but the government is still likely to draw heat over some measures – most critically for reneging on a pledge to cut the company tax rate back by one per cent.
Instead, the government plans to redirect $3.6 billion derived from their mining tax to help out middle-income families with cost-of-living pressures, while small businesses will also enjoy a tax break.
Legislation introducing another measure – the schoolkids bonus – is due to be brought before parliament on Wednesday, as the government hopes to avoid the continued spotlight over issues relating to exiled Labor MP Craig Thomson and former speaker Peter Slipper.
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