Josh Frydenberg hits back at Daniel Andrews, says Victoria has been given plenty of support

Federal Treasurer Josh Frydenberg has hit back at Dan Andrews, accusing the Victorian Premier of trying to pick a fight over his state’s latest lockdown.

Speaking to Sunrise on Friday, Mr Frydenberg said Mr Andrews had unreasonable expectations of the level of federal government support for Victoria during the state’s fluctuating outbreaks of Covid-19.

“I'm not going to take the bait and give the Victorian government the distraction it wants,” Mr Frydenberg said.

“Right now we are paying around twice what the state government is to Victorian households and businesses.

“The reality is we have provided more economic support to the Victorian people and Victorian businesses on a per capita basis than any other state.”

But Mr Andrews expressed a very different view when he slammed the federal government on Thursday.

“I want to say to Mr Frydenberg: Victorians are getting sick and tired of every time the Commonwealth Government spends $1 in Victoria, it’s treated like it’s foreign aid. Like we should bow our head and be grateful,” the Victorian Premier told reporters.

“We’re part of this country, we pay our taxes we pay more than our fair share of taxes … it is offensive.”

Mr Andrews accused the federal government of playing favourites, questioning why NSW received financial support for its construction industry during lockdown, but Victoria did not.

“The notion that you would support businesses in Sydney because they're shut down, but you wouldn’t support exactly the same businesses in exactly the same circumstances in Melbourne – It doesn’t really make any sense to me,” he said.

But Mr Frydenberg defended his government’s cash allocation, insisting it was Mr Andrews own fault that his state’s construction industry was not covered under the federal support package for Victoria.

“The reality is that the Victorian government chose not to put construction businesses in their scheme whereas it was in NSW scheme,” he told Sunrise.

“In NSW, that government has also topped up with what the federal government has been providing.

“It is very open for the Victorian government to do that in this case.”

But Mr Andrews has remained adamant that Victoria has been treated unfairly by the federal government due to being a Labor state.

“It is offensive for (Victoria) to not be receiving the same support as other parts of the country got,” he said.

“I'm disappointed with that I’ll be writing that with the Prime Minister when he gets back.”