On the day Senator Abetz and the Coalition voted against upholding the principle that areas listed as world heritage should never be logged, the Department of Agriculture Forestry and Fisheries made extraordinary claims about the Tasmanian contractors exit grants, Greens Leader Senator Christine Milne said.

Tasmanians have been left feeling disappointed and excluded from last night's federal budget, the Australian Greens said today.

"Labor has let Tasmanians down with a budget that slashes university funding and renewable energy investment and fails to care for single parents and the unemployed," Greens Leader Senator Christine Milne said.

"This budget misses opportunities to fund research and innovation, support small businesses, strengthen the agriculture sector or invest in Hobart light rail.

"The Government's failure to acknowledge the national housing crisis shows the Labor party has turned its back on millions of Australians struggling with unaffordable housing," Australian Greens housing spokesperson Senator Scott Ludlam said today.

"This Budget has no new programmes for improving housing affordability. No new money to tackle homelessness. No boost in public housing. No plans for more affordable rentals or more affordable ownership. No mention of the word housing in the Budget speech. Labor and the Coalition are pretending this crisis doesn't exist.

The 2013 Labor Budget will do little to ease the stress on country South Australians, say Australian Greens Senators Sarah Hanson Young and Penny Wright.

"Labor has spent more time listening to mining companies, the big banks and their factions than the people in rural and regional communities," Senator Hanson-Young said.

"The Greens stood up for regional South Australia during the Murray Darling Basin debate while our colleagues in the old parties and those upstream tried to sell us down the river.

It is shameful that the government has chosen to spend more than double on its no advantage rule and offshore processing regime than it has on its new education and disability programs over the forward estimates, the Australian Greens have said.

“Tonight’s budget has revealed the hideous cost that Australians are paying for Labor’s inhumane and ineffective refugee policy,” the Greens immigration spokesperson, Senator Sarah Hanson-Young said.

The Australian Greens said today that single parents and job seekers have been badly let down by the Government in this year's federal budget.

"This is a disappointing budget for the vulnerable people that Labor claim they want to look after," Senator Rachel Siewert, Australian Greens spokesperson on families and community services said today.

"The lack of care being shown for vulnerable people is a blight on Labor's record in Government.

"The few piecemeal steps contained in the budget do not deliver the help needed for the most vulnerable Australians.

The Federal Budget is a mixed bag for Western Australia, Greens Senator for WA Scott Ludlam said tonight.

Senator Ludlam, who has championed light rail for Perth since 2007, welcomed tonight's announcement that the Federal Government would provide $500 million in funding for public transport in Western Australia over the next decade.

"Many people have campaigned for years for a serious funding commitment to light rail in Perth. Half a billion dollars from the Commonwealth for light rail or the airport link is a big win for Western Australia."

Mining Tax slumps to $200 million as $1 billion taken from clean energy and the environment and $2.3 billion cut from universities

This is a disappointing Budget that will make Australia weaker, dumber and meaner say the Australian Greens.

Greens Leader Senator Christine Milne said this is demonstrated by slashing funding to universities and renewable energy, failing to support single parents and the unemployed and delaying, for the second time, our commitment to increase foreign aid to 0.5 per cent of GNI until 2017.

The Australian Greens won't be supporting legislation to enable cuts to university scholarships mooted in tonight's budget, Leader Christine Milne announced today.

"For a supposedly clever country, slashing universities is just dumb. We are robbing the future if we allow these cuts to go ahead," Senator Milne said.

"We need to support education from early childhood right through to tertiary level if we're going to move away from the cut-it-down, dig-it-up economic approach.