“We know many small businesses are having real trouble hiring for the jobs they need,” she told The Australian Financial Review.

“Offering increased salary is one way to attract talent, though that could be a challenge for businesses facing decreased consumer spend and associated income.

“It’s encouraging to see survey respondents with more than five employees are likely to increase their workforce, suggesting that despite challenging economic conditions, there is some cause for optimism for the year ahead.”

Ahead of the budget, 13 per cent of businesses said they hoped for more federal government support for hiring staff.

“With more than 7.4 million employees, small business is the largest employer in the country and accounts for more than 99 per cent of Australian enterprises,” Ms Lea said.

“Small businesses are the lifeblood of our economy, and supporting them in the upcoming federal budget is key to driving economic recovery.”

Treasurer Jim Chalmers confirmed on Sunday about 1 million small businesses around the country were in line to get extra assistance with electricity bills in the budget.

The money will flow from federal and state government coffers.

“We’ve struck eight different deals with different jurisdictions around the country,” Dr Chalmers said. “But we hope and we expect that it will take some of the sting out of these price rises, which are putting pressure on families and households and small businesses.”

The latest ANZ-Roy Morgan Australian consumer confidence monitor showed an increase of 1.8 points last week. While confidence fell in states including NSW, Victoria and South Australia, it rose in Queensland and Western Australia.

ANZ senior economist Adelaide Timbrell said the rise represented the biggest weekly increase since mid-February.

“This was driven by outright home owners, whose confidence jumped 3.7 points on average, compared with more modest increases among renters (+0.5 points) and those paying off their homes (+0.6 points).

“This may be due to an uptick in housing prices in March and April. Confidence about both finances and the economy rose during the week, with the strongest gain in confidence about ‘future economic conditions’.”

Ms Timbrell said the measure of consumers who say it is time to buy a major household item eased by 0.4 points in the survey, but was still the second-strongest result since late February.