While the mining industry brouhaha continues to hit the headlines, yesterday’s national accounts from the Bureau of Statistics paint a pleasing picture for the government: Australia’s economy grew by 0.5 percent in the first three months of this year to an annual rate of 2.7 percent. But who’s to thank and why?

Is the Rudd government to thank for its stimulus packages — like Gillard’s Building the Education Revolution — or should they be lambasted for not delivering them more effectively?

Here’s what the gang have to say:

The Age

Peter Martin: Stimulus spending keeping nation afloat

Australia’s economy is still on life support.

Tim Colebatch: Bravo, Australia, we must be a miracle economy

So we avoided recession by selling more in a world buying 20 per cent less? We must be a miracle economy.

The Daily Telegraph

Andrew Carswell and Alison Rehn: Bungle that saved nation – school building kept Australia sound

It has been condemned as a failure, but the Rudd Government’s Building the Education Revolution may have saved the Australian economy from posting a negative quarter of growth.

The Courier-Mail

Dennis Atkins: Abbott digging in the wrong sandpit

These accounts – which could be the last set before the election if a poll is held by the end of August – provide as good a set of numbers as a government would want in current circumstances. The figures not only confirm the economy kept growing at a reasonable rate in the first three months of this year but the growth was due in great part to stimulus spending.