The budget was hailed by the media as the "battlers' budget", with tax cuts supposedly aimed at lower to middle-income workers, a "future fund" for education and increased childcare rebates for working mothers. But the idea that this was a battlers' budget is a joke.

Peter Costello certainly did throw a lot of money about in a desperate bid to restore the government's election prospects.

But the real battlers - workers earning $20,000 or less-get a tax cut of just $2.88 a week, a pathetic $150 a year. Low to middle income earners get an extra $14 to $21 a week.

Meanwhile the top tax rate has been pushed further into the stratosphere. From July next year it will only apply to those earning more than $180,000. They will get a tax break of nearly $53 a week, or $2750 a year.

Overlooked amid the hype about the government's $5 billion education fund was the abolition of the cap on the number of full-fee paying places. This means the children of today can look forward to American-style debts in the hundreds of thousands of dollars by the time they reach university.

Meanwhile working mothers continue to be punished by huge childcare costs, miserly rebates and complicated tax scales that penalise them for rejoining the workforce.

But despite the incredible amount of media hyperbole surrounding the budget, many people seem to have seen through the smoke and mirrors.

Sydney's Daily Telegraph surveyed 50 voters in two key marginal electorates. Just 13 praised the budget, 20 said it would not make much difference to them and 17 said they would not be better off.

In mortgage belt seats voters are feeling the pinch of rising interest rates and increases in the cost of essential goods and services. The Telegraph calculated that most of the average family's $14 tax cut has been swallowed by higher food prices.The lack of enthusiasm for the budget reinforces Socialist Worker's analysis of the so-called golden age of economic prosperity: it has been underpinned by longer working hours, the decay of public services and infrastructure, and high levels of debt.

There is a high level of insecurity in a supposedly unprecedented period of economic growth. Nearly everyone feels that they have to work harder just to keep up.

That's why the IR laws have had such a big political impact. They create fear about the future.

It's this spectre of uncertainty the government tried to banish with its budget bribery. Howard wants workers to stop thinking about Work Choices.

But it's an issue that won't go away, if the following response to the budget is anything to go by.

James Nero is pretty close to the stereotypical Howard battler. A worker on about the average wage, living in a marginal western Sydney seat, with a large mortgage, a young family and a wife who can't work because childcare costs would outweigh the benefits.

He told The Sydney Morning Herald that the IR laws were a big factor influencing his vote and that of his co-workers in the storeroom at Woolworths.

"A lot of the people I work with voted Liberal last time, and now they're saying, 'No way' - I know people who are affected by Work Choices. For myself and my friends who have gone through it, everyday workers, there's no way I'm voting Howard."

These views emphasise the need for Labor to keep the IR laws at the centre of the election debate, rather than respond to Howard's bribery in kind or get spooked by pressure from business.

It should also remind the unions just how vital it is to keep the Rights at Work campaign on the streets right up to election day.