Sacha Barbour Gatt

Lifeblood is calling on new and returning donors to book an appointment this week.

Every 18 seconds, someone in Australia relies on a blood donation and your donation means it's there for them when they need it most.

Search blood supply or visit lifeblood.com.au to book your donation.

But there you go.

Yeah, now this lift in defence spend does take into account already announced projects related to AUKUS, including the massive submarines.

And we'll cover off new investments to modernise the defence force.

Interestingly, investments in drone and counter drone technology.

Now, the Treasurer also last night laid out how the budget is going to account for the government's response to December's terror attack in Bondi.

So this will be shared by dozens of Jewish groups to strengthen security at schools and at Jewish-run centres.

It'll also fund counter-terrorism efforts, including the ASIO-led centre, which has been designed to hunt down extremist recruitment in chat rooms and gaming platforms before it turns into real-world violence.

Yeah, and we've also seen cheaper medicines locked in, a cap of $25 on all prescriptions, and that's $7.70 for concession card holders.

That's a big one that really does help pensioners, obviously one of the most likely cohorts in Australia to be accessing medicines regularly.

Keeping that cap on, that's been confirmed in the budget.

More medicines have also been added to the PBS, making them cheaper.

Now, paid parental leave is also being extended to six months.

Again, something we already knew but locked in in the budget.

Labor says that's going to make families $14,000 better off than they would have been in 2022 when there was less access to paid parental leave or the paid parental leave allowance was lower than six months.

But, yeah, aside from the tax and fuel changes that we've already discussed today, Chris,

that's about it for cost of living in terms of what you or I or our parents or our brothers or sisters or aunties or uncles are going to see.

Now, it's interesting because cost of living relief has been a major focus for budgets, both state, territory and federal since COVID started.