‘Familiar’ cost of living relief in budget

There will be no new cost of living measures in the upcoming federal budget that have not already been made public, the treasurer says.

The budget will contain “familiar” initiatives to help households manage soaring living costs, including boosted childcare supports, relief for medicine costs and measures to “get wages moving again”.

Treasurer Jim Chalmers said the government was up against “serious fiscal constraints”.

“We think we’ve got a good, responsible set of cost of living measures which will make a real difference to the lives of Australians,” Dr Chalmers said.

He also said the government needed to avoid fuelling inflation.

“The budget has got a big job to do, because we’ve got to make sure that we’re not adding to inflationary pressures that the Reserve Bank is dealing with independently,” he told reporters on Wednesday.

Dr Chalmers said the budget’s focus would be on supply side pressures.

“Whether that is labour shortages, whether it’s some of the issues around self-sufficiency – these are key priorities in the budget,” he said.

The central bank is broadly expected to hike the official cash rate for the fifth month in a row when the Reserve Bank of Australia board meets next week.

Successive rate hikes seem to be dampening activity in the construction sector, with building approvals falling 17.2 per cent in July.

New apartment developments led the fall in building approvals.

Despite the sharp drop off in building approvals, a small lift in construction work is expected for the second quarter.

A shortage of materials and labour, as well as bad weather, has led to a backlog of unfinished construction projects, according to JP Morgan analyst Jack Stinson.

The Australian Bureau of Statistics will on Wednesday release its quarterly data on construction work done.