AWU: Brutal Budget - An Assault On Future Economy

The Abbott Government's first budget has slashed programs that promote economic and employment growth and disproportionately attacked the living standards of working people, according to Australian Workers' Union.

AWU Assistant National Secretary Scott McDine said it was absurd for the government to sell its brutal budget as responsible.

"Anyone can wield an axe - the tough bit is in planning for regrowth and this where the budget is disturbingly lacking," Mr McDine said.

"Conservatives may yearn for the perfect world of economics textbooks where everything magically sorts itself out, but the fact is that industry needs government support, guidance and leadership if it is to thrive and provide quality jobs for Australians into the future.

"Cutting programs that are designed to stimulate future economic and employment growth is not prudent management - it is simply irresponsible.”

Mr McDine singled out the $340 million in cuts to the research and development funding, and more than $1 billion cut from vocational training and apprenticeship support, as particularly damaging.

"Slashing the Research and Development Tax Incentive to support firms’ research and development will cost our economy untold millions in the medium to long term," Mr McDine said.

"Ripping a billion dollars from vocational training and apprentice support will only create a more dire skills shortage than we face at the moment. The future the Abbott Government is creating through these cuts is a future of dependence on guest labour - although perhaps that is the point."

Mr McDine said taking $850 million cut from industry programs was shortsighted thinking at its worst.

“The money that was assigned to industry programs is an investment, not a cost,” he said.

“Cutting it today is simply an assault on the economy of tomorrow.”

Mr McDine also took aim at the fairness of the budget, saying it disproportionately hurt average workers.

"There's been a lot of rhetoric about how this budget hurts everyone, but the fact is it is average workers who will feel most of the pain," Mr McDine said.

"When you rip $80 billion from public hospitals and schools, when you unwind universal healthcare, when you raise the pension age to 70 - these are measures that will cause genuine hurt in middle Australia. To say this attack on working people is fairly balanced by a temporary two per cent lift in the top income bracket is just insulting."