Editorial: Plenty of promise in poll plans

SCOTT Morrison’s third Budget has made the next election a much more open contest than many had anticipated.

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TRUST is a precious commodity in politics, especially in Australia where a decade of often-dysfunctional behaviour, broken promises and leadership merry-go-rounds have more than tested the patience of voters.

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and Treasurer Scott Morrison have clearly been well aware of this as they’ve shaped their third Budget.

It’s not too generous, even if it does contain long-overdue personal income tax cuts which begin modestly, and it doesn’t repeat the heavy-handed spending cuts of Joe Hockey and Tony Abbott from four years ago.

This might mean the Budget will fail to make enough people happy in the short term. Some will feel short-changed by tax cuts that amount to little more than $10 a week, while fiscal conservatives will wonder why the brakes on spending have been eased and the fight against debt and deficit appears to have been paused.

Of course, neither of these complaints is completely fair.

The immediate tax cuts will be rapid relief to those on low incomes. In the long term they amount to about $140 billion over the coming decade – and there is a structural reform that tackles bracket creep or fiscal drag in a way no government has ever done before.

Also, while there has been a retreat on the slash and burn cost cutting from the first Hockey Budget there is a large measure of restraint on spending with growth limited to an average of 1.9 per cent, placing it at the lowest level since the Summer of Love in 1968.

As we remarked yesterday ahead of the Budget, any squibbing on urgently needed Budget repair would be disappointing. We are mightily let down by the fact what progress is going to be made on reducing net debt – as welcome as it might be – is left to the natural progress of measures in the Budget rather than any new assault on what is, for many Australians, a burden they do not want to leave for their children and grandchildren.

Of course, this is a pre-election Budget and the Government has made its choices with that in mind, as much as it might like to say this is what they would have been doing anyway.

The tax cuts will be welcomed and the promise of more to come could well steer voters to the Coalition’s column, just as the congestion-busting infrastructure spending and the new benefits for older Australians will not go unnoticed.

Queensland, which is going to be crucial for the fortunes of the Turnbull Government, has been looked after with money for the Bruce Highway, the Pacific Motorway, the Brisbane Metro and other road and rail projects.

While these sweeteners are plain to see, there is an element of danger in all that’s on offer.

It’s poll peril to ask voters to cast their vote on the promise of tax cuts to be delivered in full seven years into the future.

However, this game of trust and risk is a two-way street and we will be watching and listening when Opposition Leader Bill Shorten delivers his response to this Budget tomorrow night.

Mr Morrison last night implored Australians to stick with his plan because “we can’t afford to risk the alternative”.

Whether or not voters are going to feel confident enough to hand the keys to the Treasury back to Labor just five years after the slapstick chaos of the Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard terms is open to great doubt. Politicians have to earn the trust of voters, and while Labor went close in 2016 that was a very different set of circumstances which are not going to replicated when we next go to the polls.

Mr Shorten might be able to deliver a slick set of focus group-tested lines, but he might not be seen as someone who people want to run the country.

That’s when this great game of risk becomes serious.

This Budget has made the next election a much more open contest than many have anticipated. It is going to be a fascinating battle in which the economy will be the main game with the age old question – who do you trust? – again put centre stage for voters.

Originally published as Editorial: Plenty of promise in poll plans