Ross Clark
Standard (one of the many jobs he now has) on May 2 he ran with a headline: “Brussels twists the knife on Brexit.” This was based on a tweet by European Parliament negotiator Guy Verhofstadt which had been blown out of all proportion.
The Standard that day also carried a leader declaring that Brexit was a “historic mistake”. Osborne followed it up with a leader just before election day which, while notionally advising people to vote Conservative, carried barbed comments against the Prime Minister herself, accusing her of “stigmatising immigrants” and claiming that her premiership was based on a “personality cult”. Osborne’s coverage of the general election campaign was obviously not balanced, objective reporting of the news but then neither was it in the great tradition of a campaigning newspaper making its case.
It was simply a rookie editor, who has never had a senior role in the industry and is spectacularly ill-qualified for the post, thinking that the purpose of a newspaper is to give its editor a megaphone for his personal grievances. In doing so Osborne has broken one of the first rules of journalism: don’t become the story yourself.
Even Polly Toynbee, one of Britain’s most Left-wing commentators who appeared with
YET he seems to lack any insight as to why he had to be removed from his job last July. He had invested so much in a Remain vote that his position as Chancellor was untenable. He had used the full apparatus of government to pump out propaganda claiming that Britain would suffer up to 800,000 job losses and the economy would shrink up to six per cent in the aftermath of a vote for Brexit.
Had Britain voted to Remain he would have got away with it. But instead his hyperbolic predictions were quickly shown to be wrong.
Even so, Osborne could have stuck it out in the House of Commons. Instead he just gave up on Parliament completely as soon as a high-profile job came along. With a likely vacancy at Number 10 before the next election how he must regret his decision to leave politics.
Theresa May has been compared in recent days to former PM Edward Heath, who in 1974 called an unnecessary election and emerged the loser. But if you are looking for a latterday Ted Heath, George Osborne is a far closer match. The last 27 years of Heath’s political career were described as “the incredible sulk”, so bitter was he at losing the Tory leadership to Margaret Thatcher.
The difference is that Heath was 58 when he lost his post as leader. Osborne is still only 46. Either he snaps out of his bitterness or some very long and very tragic decades lie ahead.
‘He must feel bitter about being sacked’