Withdrawing government support by dropping proposed tax cuts would be downright dumb," Richardson says, describing the standard of debate about tax as "woeful".

"Withdrawing government support by dropping proposed tax cuts would be downright dumb," Richardson says, describing the standard of debate about tax as "woeful". Richardson says the criticism of stage three is "entirely undeserved". Both Deloitte and Treasury modelling of the tax cuts, even when considering flat wages growth, shows the top income earners will contribute a relatively similar share of tax overall to government coffers with the plan as they would've without it.

On Deloitte's figures by the time the cuts kick in by 2024, the top 10 per cent of earners will contribute 44.8 per cent to total income tax collected by the government - effectively the same as now. The wealthiest 1 per cent would pay a higher proportion on all these measures.