The Morrison government has made an audacious bid for re-election with an $8.6 billion cost-of-living package that slashes petrol tax by 22 cents per litre for six months, gives 10 million low and middle-income earners a one-off, bonus tax rebate of $420, and hands $250 cheques to six million pensioners and welfare recipients.

The budget, the springboard for an election to be called within days, forecast a modest recovery in real wages from next financial year onwards, and also sent a message of post-election, post-pandemic restraint by using the majority of dividends from a rapidly rebounding economy to start corralling debt and deficit.