A “once-in-a-lifetime opportunity” to drive unemployment below 4 per cent, and budget restraint designed to keep a lid on inflation are key to Scott Morrison’s hopes of securing his government a fourth term.

With his government lagging Labor in the polls following a bruising summer marred by the omicron outbreak, the Prime Minister used a year-opening speech to the National Press Club to nominate economic management as the battleground on which he will fight the federal election.