Emboldened by the swing that secured its by-election win in Queensland, the federal opposition is pivoting its attack on the government to focus on the cost of living and Labor’s economic management.

Former Gold Coast City councillor Cameron Caldwell won the seat of Fadden for the LNP on Saturday, with a 2.4 per cent swing, after campaigning on living costs.

Deputy Liberal Leader Sussan Ley will spearhead the Coalition’s attack after announcing a blitz of federal seats across the country.

On Sunday, she will begin in Treasurer Jim Chalmers’ Queensland electorate Rankin, before travelling up the state, and then visiting Victoria, Tasmania, and South Australia.

Ms Ley said since Labor was elected to government in May 2022, it had squandered a crucial window to tackle high inflation with its “big tax and big spend approach”.

“Australian families are hurting. Every time they go to the checkout, reach the next mortgage repayment, or see a new bill come in, the costs are piling up, crushing families and smashing small businesses,” she said.

“Most Australians are feeling that pain, that feeling that things are getting harder. Well, I can tell Australians who to blame: Albo-nomics.”

Ms Ley plans to visit 17 seats across four states in the final fortnight of the federal parliamentary recess.

“This is really tough, and we need a government with a proper plan,” she later told Sky News.

Asked about the government’s appointment of Michele Bullock as the Reserve Bank’s next governor, Ms Ley said the decision was “sound”.

“Great to see a woman from rural Australia,” she told Sky News.

“The issue is … the government is not doing their job. They need a plan that kills inflation and we don’t want them to continually turn and point to the RBA.”

The RBA has been steadily raising the cash interest rate since May last year to the current 4.10 per cent to rein in too-high inflation. This has resulted in higher mortgage and lending rates for consumers.

The annualised consumer price index is about 7 per cent and a long way from the central bank’s preferred 2-3 per cent target range.

At the same, the economy appears to be faltering, albeit in line with Treasury forecasts.

Dr Chalmers said the government understood before the Fadden byelection, voters were “under the pump” over cost of living pressures.

“This was hardly Labor heartland, this seat on the northern Gold Coast, which has been very, very difficult for us for a really long time,” he told the ABC’s Insiders on Sunday.

Dr Chalmers said Labor needed to perform better at the federal level in Queensland, but said there were opportunities for the party in the state.

The central bank’s next decision on interest rates will be revealed on the first Tuesday in August.

-with AAP