Leigh Sales quizzes Scott Morrison on 7.30 last night. Picture: Screengrab

Instead he copped a roasting as the ABC presenter grilled the Treasurer over the release of yesterday’s mid-year Budget update.

In last night’s interview Sales got straight to the point, asking Mr Morrison if the release of the projections meant life for Australians was going to get a lot harder.

“It’s going to be harder to get a payrise, harder to get a full time job and harder to get elective surgery,” she said.

The Treasurer defended the forecast by saying it was a difficult space for the Australian economy to perform well in and the government was actually expecting real growth of 2 per cent.

He also went on to say that in most countries this would be considered an upgrade and not a downgrade.

But Sales wasn’t letting him off easy and then went on to mention how former Treasurer Joe Hockey predictions of a budget deficit hasn’t yet eventuated.

Referring to the Coalition’s first budget, Sales pointed out how former Treasurer Joe Hockey in 2014 predicted by the next year that the budget deficit would be $2.8 billion.

Treasurer Scott Morrison defended the government’s MYEFO figures on the program.Source:ABC

“Today the budget deficit for next year is predicted to be $28.7 billion,” she said. “That’s the result of two years of economic management by the Coalition.”

Mr Morrison fired back said the difference between those two numbers is what has happened to revenue over those period of times and that in fact expenditure is actually less.

The answer didn’t sit well with Sales who then said: “The Coalition never accepted that excuse from Wayne Swan”.

The Treasurer maintained the difference was Labor’s forward projections would turn a $44 billion deficit into a $1 billion surplus in one year.

“The figures I’ve outlined are cautious, conservative forecasts, it’s a very measured document,” he said.

“I can’t speak for Wayne Swan’s budget, he said he was delivering four surpluses, they never turned up.”

Sales then accused him of applying different standards to Labor to those which he applied against himself.

“It seems that you apply a different standard for the reasons that economies, you know, that some of the numbers change or go backwards ... it seems that you apply a different standard to Labor than you apply to yourself,” she said.

Mr Morrison dismissed the argument and said that was her commentary not his and the reality was that Labor had unrealistic expectations for growth.

The grilling comes after Australia yesterday avoided a feared downgrade of its coveted AAA credit rating after sticking to its ambition of returning the budget to surplus in 2020-21 despite softer growth forecasts

In a midyear fiscal update, the government revised down the nation’s cash deficit of $37.1 billion in 2016-17 — as announced in the May budget — to $36.5 million.

Financial ratings agency Standard and Poor’s warned Australia’s rating could be lowered if Canberra did not improve its budget balances and deliver on surplus plans.