The Abbott government enters the week buoyed by news that against the odds, and despite being weighed down by the worst internal divisions it has yet endured, voters still expect it to govern and many want it to succeed.

While Mr Abbott, and his Praetorian Guard of senior ministers, know how close they have come to disaster, the Fairfax-Ipsos poll, coupled with the Newspoll last week, validates their unfashionable argument that even this government can trade its way out of current political insolvency.

What was shaping as a moment of extreme danger for Mr Abbott, the regularly scheduled Tuesday party room meeting, is now expected to be unremarkable.

 

Those agitating for a swift "necking" of the Prime Minister in the interests of installing Malcolm Turnbull have had their best argument diluted for the time being: namely that the Coalition decline was unstoppable without the change.

Liberals contacted by Fairfax Media said a move had been contingent on action by ministers anyway and there was no sign of that occurring.

The government's week will now be built around its Thursday release of the five-yearly Intergenerational Report – a four-decade projection of the long-run threats, opportunities, liabilities, and trends facing the nation.

Treasurer Joe Hockey, who has been under almost as much referred pressure as Mr Abbott, has variously warned that the IGR will rock people with the scale of the fiscal challenge, but will also give cause for optimism.

Either way, the government plan is to use the IGR to reframe the economic debate and build a wider public justification to make budget sacrifices now in order to put Medicare, the pension system, higher education, and the National Disability Insurance Scheme on a sustainable footing.

For Bill Shorten's Labor opposition, the message in the poll recovery is also clear: government unpopularity has taken it as far as it will go, From here, policy and substance are required.

 

To that end, Mr Shorten will on Monday unveil initiatives designed to address one of the least popular aspects of our economy: multinational tax minimisation.

Costed by the independent Parliamentary Budget Office, the package is said to be worth an extra $1.9 billion over four years in additional revenue.

"Labor believes everyone should pay their fair share of tax in Australia," Mr Shorten told Fairfax Media.

"How can we ask Australians to work hard and pay tax if we let big multinationals off the hook?

"Labor's priority will be to shut down loopholes that allow big multinationals to send profits overseas."

Among the suite of measures to be applied by a future Labor government would be a tightening of so called "thin capitalisation" rules which allow companies to offset profits against debt servicing costs in high tax jurisdictions such as Australia to reduce their taxable income.

A number of other compliance measures are also included in the yet to be finalised package which would see increased scrutiny by the Australian Tax Office.

Labor believes the approach is sound on policy grounds but it will be popular too.

It is aimed at big multinationals like Apple, James Hardy, and Chevron, which transfer profits and losses within their respective corporate groups to maximise profit and minimise liabilities.

Last financial year, Apple paid just $83 million in Australian tax from local revenue of $6 billion.

With parliament sitting this week, Liberals say they are looking for continued improvement from their Prime Minister on the political front – with less politics and more leadership on policy.

"He's still on notice," said one.