Family time for treasurer ahead of budget

Federal treasurer Jim Chalmers didn’t appear nervous about delivering his first ever federal budget next week when he fronted media cameras on Saturday.

Mr Chalmers was joined by his three children — Seven-year-old Leo, five-year-old Annabel and three-year-old Jack — for a photo opportunity at his Brisbane office.

Aside from his own, Mr Chalmers said Aussie families being hit by rising cost of living and ongoing natural disasters would be a central feature of the budget.

In an address on Friday, he told reporters the government’s economic approach would take into account the many Australians doing it tough.

Cost of living relief would be a feature but those considering changes also needed to be “very, very careful” about the risk of pushing inflation even higher than it already is, Mr Chalmers said.

The treasurer described rising inflation as the primary influence on the budget.

“I’ve tried to explain over the course of the last few weeks, the difficult balancing act of trying to ensure that we provide that cost of living relief in responsible ways, that has an economic dividend and isn’t counterproductive when it comes to the considerations of the independent Reserve Bank,” Mr Chalmers said.

The Reserve Bank of Australia targets monetary policy at achieving an inflation rate of two to three per cent but at the moment it is closer to seven per cent.

Another expected feature of Tuesday’s budget will be the push to get worker wages, which have been stagnant for the past 10 years, moving again.

“A big part of our thinking, as we put the finishing touches on the budget, is that wages are about cost of living too,” Mr Chalmers said.

“We’ve had almost a decade now of stagnant wages. That’s because that was a deliberate design feature of our predecessors’ economic policy. We take a different approach.”

During his address, Mr Chalmers also zeroed in on the effect of ongoing widespread flooding, which by his department’s estimation, would detract about a quarter of a percentage point from GDP growth in the December quarter.

“It is too early for us to put a very precise price tag on the flooding that we’re seeing through such large swathes of Australia,” he said.

“We need to remember here that we are talking about some of the best producing land in the world, producing a lot of groceries for domestic consumption but also for export.

“What’s happening here to these areas is particularly cruel I think, given how close many of these farms were to producing what was expected to be a bumper crop.”