Supposedly hemmed in by a "Labor-lite" budget featuring some of his best ideas, Bill Shorten was meant to be a leader under pressure.
That was the plan running under Malcolm Turnbull's newly centrist, low-friction budget, which claims to bolster education, raid bank profits, reinforce Medicare, secure the NDIS, and build economy-enhancing infrastructure.
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Health, education and same-sex marriage
Bill Shorten sticks with Labor's traditional strengths as he responds to the federal budget.
Yet right on cue, the opposition leader was handed a gift on Thursday just hours before outlining his official response.
It came in the form of an updated 10-year cost of Malcolm Turnbull's proposed company tax cut at $65.4 billion - up from the original $48.2 billion.
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Shorten suddenly had more money to fund his spending proposals, and an even bigger stick with which to belt Malcolm Turnbull as agent of the big end of town. Lickety-split.
Treasurer Scott Morrison explained that the new number simply came from a new measuring period: the 10-year cost from July 2017 rather than from July 2016, and thus, two full years of the final system rather than one.
But in politics, a simple lie trumps a complex truth. Besides, both sides are gilding the lily on company tax - as both know the Senate will not pass the second tranche extending to medium and large enterprises.
Doubtless, politics has been changed by Turnbull's leftward shimmy. The clearest evidence of this is Labor's switch to conviction and values, with Shorten arguing neither are present in Turnbull's second budget.
Shorten was at his most forceful when recommitting to his banking royal commission, declaring that if any bank passes on a dollar from Turnbull's new tax, it should be the end of the PM and his treasurer. It was a neat redirection.
And on the company tax cut where he ridiculed the Treasury modelling as a pittance for workers: "We're talking about an extra $2 a day…in 20 years' time," he said, contrasting "$65 billion for big business and ten bucks a week for workers in 2027."
But he has taken a risk in opposing the increased Medicare levy to directly fund the NDISÂ except for the top two tax brackets. Echoes of class war politics?
If Shorten is under new pressure, he did a passable job of not showing it. Yet his party has been stung by the Coalition's appropriation of the middle ground.
In recent days, both leaders have emphasised the words presented to them by focus groups. For Turnbull, that word is "fairness". For Shorten, "millionaires".
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