Australian PM Scott Morrison announces early budget as MP quits over treatment of women

Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison said on Tuesday his government will deliver its annual budget early as it prepares for an election due by May, but suffered an immediate setback when one of his MPs said she was quitting his party.

Morrison said his conservative Liberal-National coalition government would deliver Australia’s first budget surplus since 2007/2008. The new budget year begins July 1.

Morrison said the budget would be delivered on April 2, about a month earlier than usual. His government must call an election by May and opinion polls suggest the coalition is on course for a heavy defeat by the Labor opposition.

“It will be a surplus budget. It will be a budget which is the product of the years of hard work of our government,” Morrison told reporters in Canberra.

The promise of a healthy budget comes as Morrison seeks to repair his government’s standing with voters, who were angered by a party-room revolt in August that ousted former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull.

The toppling of Turnbull pushed the government into minority when it lost Turnbull’s seat, normally a Liberal stronghold, in a by-election this month after the former premier quit politics. That minority status came into effect on Monday.