Tony Abbott will use Intergenerational report to sell Budget

ANALYSIS

THE Intergenerational Report to be released today will be a dense, forward-looking guide to the economy which will amount to an elaborate “I told you so”.

The Government will use the report to justify dumping policies of past Labor governments and elevating its own measures in the Budget last May.

The report will take an informed look at the shape of Australia in 40 years time, but like its three predecessors it will largely be about the contemporary political struggle.

Prime Minister Tony Abbott has already announced it will show Commonwealth debt would have soared if Labor’s spending had been sustained. But under his Budget — had it made it through the Senate intact — a surplus would have been achieved and maintained for 35 years from 2019.

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It’s stunning that any government could claim to make an accurate depiction of economic life four decades hence when annual Budget projections can fall into a heap after just six months.

But there will be valid forecasts from this report, as there were with the first three, as to the nation’s changing demographics and the effect these changes will have on what we can afford. It will be interesting to see what has been included and what has been excluded.

We again will be told Australia’s aged population is growing and adding to the costs of health and welfare services.

We might not be given forecasts as to the effect of climate change on national productivity and outlays.

We will be told more taxpayers will be needed, with older people urged to put off retirement and stay at work.

We might not be told how big the population should be in 40 years and the tole of immigration in reaching that target.

The Government knows the overall shape of its second Budget to be released in May and the report will be designed to argue for those measures two months before their release.

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