Slash taxes and sack George Osborne

George Osborne has done precious little to salvage Britain's broken economy, says Matthew Lynn. It's time a new chancellor was found with the guts to make real changes.

Gordon Brown did so many terrible things to the economy it was hard to keep track. He also created the impression that chancellors could never be moved. That has allowed George Osborne to sit tight in No. 11 so long as David Cameron is living next door. Maybe it's time he was moved on.

The idea that you keep the same chancellor for a parliament or two is fairly new. They used to change quite regularly, often in mid-term. Mrs Thatcher got through three during her decade in office: Geoffrey Howe, Nigel Lawson, and John Major.

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Matthew Lynn

Matthew Lynn is a columnist for Bloomberg, and writes weekly commentary syndicated in papers such as the Daily Telegraph, Die Welt, the Sydney Morning Herald, the South China Morning Post and the Miami Herald. He is also an associate editor of Spectator Business, and a regular contributor to The Spectator. Before that, he worked for the business section of the Sunday Times for ten years. 

He has written books on finance and financial topics, including Bust: Greece, The Euro and The Sovereign Debt Crisis and The Long Depression: The Slump of 2008 to 2031. Matthew is also the author of the Death Force series of military thrillers and the founder of Lume Books, an independent publisher.