2022 Election: Jim Chalmers pledges to avoid austerity, unnecessary cash splashes in budget to be delivered this year

In a speech to the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry on Tuesday, Jim Chalmers will also challenge Treasurer Josh Frydenberg to three debates before the federal election in May.

Mr Chalmers' pitch will include a pledge to make easing cost of living and ending rorts "central features" of Labor's economic management.

The Labor treasury portfolio spokesman will accuse the Coalition of wracking up unprecedented debt with "nowhere near enough to show for it".

"The days of being lectured on fiscal responsibility by our political opponents are well and truly over," he will say.

"No government since the war has gone to an election with a worse record on the budget, or with less of a grasp of, or vision for, the future."

Mr Chalmers will warn further stagnation "can't be the thanks Australians get" for enduring two years of the COVID-19 pandemic.

But in an apparent attempt to head off accusations of reckless spending, he will pledge to carefully weigh the value of every dollar spent.

"It can't be yet another budget long on politics and short on purpose, another political patch and paint job," he will say.

"Our fiscal strategy recognises now is not the time to flick the switch to austerity. Nor is it time to spray money around unnecessarily. Uncertain times like these call for fine judgments."

Mr Frydenberg will hand down the Coalition's final budget before the election at the end of this month, telling Australian Community Media the government will rein in spending to maintain "fiscal firepower".

The predicted budget deficit - $69 billion - is $30 billion less than the federal government forecast in December, provided no additional spending is unveiled next week.

But after hits from natural disasters and COVID-19, Mr Frydenberg did flag an employment scheme for disadvantaged Australians and support for families to ease cost-of-living pressures.

Those pressures have been exacerbated by skyrocketing petrol prices, which Prime Minister Scott Morrison has attributed to Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

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Mr Chalmers will suggest concerns predated the invasion and the COVID-19 pandemic, saying stagnant wages have suppressed Australians' buying power for years.

"The economy of 2019 was not in great shape, nor was the budget," he will say.

"Much of what we are proposing is not just repairing the pandemic economy, but ensuring it's stronger after COVID than it was before."

Mr Chalmers will also pledge to hand down a federal budget by the end of 2022, though the exact timing will be determined by advice from Treasury.

It will include a focus on growing the economy through job creation, although he concedes a single budget "could not possibly undo all of the damage of the last 10 years".

"We ask to be judged on the quality of our investments, not just the quantity of the spending," he will say.

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