The national president of the Vietnam Veterans Association has slammed the Federal Coalition's political references to war as "tasteless in the extreme".

Treasurer Scott Morrison has accused the Opposition Leader Bill Shorten of using "tax as bullets" as part of a "war on business".

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull did not back away from the language used.

"The reality is that Bill Shorten has declared a war on business and the first casualties are jobs," he said.

"The first casualties of Shorten's war on business are Australian jobs."

The comments came as a repatriation ceremony was held in Sydney for Australian soldiers and dependants who were buried in military cemeteries in Malaysia and Singapore during the Vietnam War.

Vietnam Veterans Association of Australia president Ken Foster spent time with the soldiers' families at the ceremony in Richmond and said Mr Turnbull had not considered their suffering.

"For them to go home tonight and see a comparison of the war that their family members were killed in and have just been brought home from around 50 years later for a political argument, I see that as tasteless in the extreme," he said.

"I'd like them, when they're thinking about the sacrifice of veterans and the sacrifice of their families, to please not put it into comparison with some of the damage that's done on the stock exchange or in the business world."

Mr Foster said war and the challenges faced by businesses or politicians were completely different.

"With a war situation you go in there literally to destroy the enemy," he said.

"I don't believe our political parties should be using a comparison of the way a war is fought to a political argument."