Everyone must pitch in for budget: Rudd

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has hinted welfare payments to high-income households might be pruned in the May budget, saying everyone has to do their bit for the nation.

The budget was being framed amid the toughest global economic circumstances any government had faced in three-quarters of a century, he said.

Mr Rudd was asked if he shared the view Australians - even high-income earners - had developed an "entitlement mentality".

"We are a nation where everyone has got to pitch in and do their bit," Mr Rudd told reporters in Canberra.

He also warned the opposition not to get in the way of the government's national broadband network plan.

He said the government's cash handouts in two stimulus packages were aimed at supporting 1.5 million workers in the retail industry.

He said there was also medium-term stimulus in the pipeline with the biggest school modernisation program the country had ever seen under way.

"We will be kicking in with longer-term stimulus with the biggest infrastructure project we've seen, since the Snowy (Mountains Hydro) and before the Snowy, with the national broadband network," he said.

"Operating at all these three levels we're providing stimulus, and I would be pretty disappointed if anyone gets in the way of that."

theage.com.au 29 Apr 2009

Except politicians, where they give themselves a payrise of $4,700.

See couriermail.com.au article:
Pay rise for politicians as recession bites