In 2005, as the newly appointed shadow chancellor, George Osborne explored possibilities for introducing a flat rate of income tax, citing Estonia as a model and inspiration. Back then, at the age of 34, he seemed to be a conventionally Eurosceptic, low-tax, small-state right-winger. Even if he self-identified as a moderniser and social liberal – as a metropolitan he was relaxed about many of the issues that unsettled social conservatives such as Margaret Thatcher, from race and immigration to gay rights and the equalities agenda – his free-market economics were bone-dry. In his early years as Chancellor, a role he took on in 2010, he seemed to be conforming to stereotype as he compared Britain to Greece and, against Keynesian orthodoxy, introduced deep spending cuts to the current and, disastrously, to the capital budget. “Slasher Osborne”, he was called by David Blanchflower, the former member of the Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Committee who is one of his most trenchant opponents.
At the 2012 Paralympics in London, Osborne was booed by the crowd during a medal presentation ceremony. It hurt him deeply. This was the same year as the “omnishambles” Budget, the carelessness of which undermined his reputation for strategic brilliance. In 2013, a ComRes poll for the Sunday Mirror and the Independent on Sunday adjudged him the politician people would least like to share Christmas with and run the country. Unfairly or otherwise, Osborne had become Britain’s most reviled politician, caricatured as a caddish Tory baronet wilfully inflicting hardship on the poor.
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