‘Everything will be worse under Dutton’: Chalmers on the economic attack

Treasurer Jim Chalmers has ramped up his attack on Opposition Leader Peter Dutton’s economic credibility, insisting Australians would be worse off under the Coalition as both major parties tussle to persuade voters they can help with cost of living ahead of the election.

Conceding the government needed to improve its economic messaging, Chalmers on Thursday went on a media blitz across Nine’s Today Show, ABC, Sky News and Sunrise to defend his record as the latest polling by this masthead showed Dutton now in the lead as preferred prime minister.

Treasurer Jim Chalmers, right, has branded Opposition Leader Peter Dutton’s promise to allow small businesses to deduct staff lunches a “complete farce”.Credit: Glenn Hunt, Alex Ellinghausen

Despite underlying inflation falling to 3.5 per cent in the September quarter last year – down from 5.2 per cent the year prior – half of voters polled for this masted by Reserve Political Monitor expected inflation to worsen, rejecting Labor assurances that price pressures will continue to ease.

Speaking on ABC News Breakfast, Chalmers took aim at Dutton’s promise to allow small businesses to deduct staff lunches from their taxable income. “This policy is a complete farce,” he said. “What they do want is taxpayer-funded long lunches and golf days. After three years of opposition, this is the best they can come up with when it comes to economic policy.”

The Coalition has so far refused to reveal details about the assumed costs of their business deduction policy and has not yet revealed if and where it will make spending cuts.

Dutton on Thursday refused to answer a question on his costings, saying “we don’t dance according to the demands of Jim Chalmers”.

Chalmers also labelled Dutton “a risk to household budgets” on Sunrise before telling the Today Show that Australians worried about the cost of living would be worse off under Dutton.

“Peter Dutton’s gone after Medicare before, he’ll push down wages again, he’ll push up electricity prices with this nuclear insanity, and he’ll take Australia backwards,” Chalmers said.

At a doorstop at Parliament House, Chalmers also branded the Coalition “job snobs” for their recent criticism of the fact that about four in five new jobs taken up in the past two years were in the non-market sector: areas including healthcare, education and the public service.

“When they draw this distinction, [the Coalition] want to diminish Australians who care for other Australians,” he said.

Chalmers said the latest polling results were not a surprise given the pressure people were feeling to manage expenses but acknowledged the government could “do better” in explaining how the economy was tracking.

“We’ve got inflation down, wages up and unemployment low, but that doesn’t always translate into how people are feeling and faring in the economy,” he told the Today show.

However, he spruiked measures taken by the government to ease cost of living pressures, including its backflip last year on Stage 3 tax cuts.

“Saturday is the one-year anniversary of the difficult decision that Anthony Albanese and I took to make sure that every Australian taxpayer got a tax cut, not just some,” Chalmers said.

Chalmers pointed to new analysis by Treasury released on Monday that showed Australian taxpayers would on average get bigger tax cuts in the next financial year, assuming wages continue to grow.

The average tax cut is expected to climb from $1888 this financial year to $1944 in the 2025-26 financial year, with the forecasts showing income for the average worker will eclipse $80,000.

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