The Courier & Advertiser (Perth and Perthshire Edition)
Osborne’s latest job sparks row
Former Chancellor will edit London Evening Standard four days a week...but plans to continue as MP for Tatton
Former Chancellor George Osborne has been appointed editor of the London Evening Standard.
He will take up his role in May, editing the newspaper four days a week, but will remain as a Conservative MP.
His appointment was met with incredulity and criticism from some MPs and journalists, with calls for him to step down from his seat of Tatton in Cheshire.
Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn said the appointment makes a “mockery of media neutrality and insults the voters he is supposed to serve” while former Tatton MP Martin Bell, whom Mr Osborne replaced in 2001, wondered if the announcement was “fake news”.
The National Union of Journalists said: “Genuinely qualified journalists who would have done this hugely important job seriously are seeing it snatched away in a blatant, cynical political move.”
Mr Osborne, who was sacked as Chancellor by Theresa May last year, replaces Sarah Sands, who is leaving after five years to join the BBC.
He said: “I am proud to be a Conservative MP, but as editor and leader of a team of dedicated and independent journalists, our only interest will be to give a voice to all Londoners.”
Speaking to staff in his new office, Mr Osborne said he would listen to their advice over how they produce a “great paper”, adding: “I have got to learn from you, because I may have run a country but I have never run a newspaper.”
The new job brings the total he holds to six, including one unpaid role and his public speaking.
Mr Osborne is paid £162,500 every three months for 12 days working as an “adviser on the global economy” for the BlackRock Investment Institute.
He will be paid £120,000 this year to be a Kissinger Fellow at the McCain Institute in Washington, DC.
This comes on top of his £74,000 salary as an MP, while he has also registered more than £780,000 paid for 14 speeches since last September.
In Tatton – 190 miles from Mr Osborne’s new job – publican Lee King said: “How can somebody work four days a week doing something and be an MP? It just doesn’t make sense. It’s madness.”