George Osborne got it stupendously wrong by misjudging Brexit – he shouldn’t even qualify for a Companion of Honour

DOES George Osborne deserve to be a Companion of Honour, one of the highest accolades the Queen can bestow for outstanding political achievement?

Its 65 hand-picked members are entitled to use the coveted “CH” after their name once embraced by the Establishment’s crème de la crème.

Does the ex-Chancellor who led what many regard as a scurrilous scare campaign to keep Britain in the floundering EU qualify for such a distinction?

It was Osborne who threatened economic isolation, soaring unemployment and an emergency tax-raising budget if we dared to vote OUT.

It was Osborne who persuaded figures like German finance minister Wolfgang Schäuble and tainted IMF chief Christine Lagarde to peddle his grotesque Project Fear.

And it was Osborne who recruited his pal Mark Carney — seen in the City as the most blatantly political governor in the history of the Bank of England — to warn of Brexit meltdown.

But above all, Mr Osborne got it stupendously wrong.

Not by picking the losing side in a legitimate argument, but by totally misjudging a defining moment in British history.

He blindly supported the Grand European Project in the face of incontrovertible evidence that it was already disintegrating under our feet.

It was the Remain camp, led and directed by George Osborne, who peddled lies and smears against those insisting UK plc would prosper outside.

Now we know who was right.

Far from going bust, Britain stands to benefit from a tidal wave of inward investment, booming exports and lucrative trade deals.

Banks and businesses are already expanding and the surging stock market has given a vital shot in the arm to Britain’s battered pension funds.

We are creating more jobs than ever and the housing industry is thriving despite being clobbered by Mr Osborne long before the referendum.

Many EU voters want what we’re having.

The Pound may be down but economists agree it was previously overpriced and a burden for exporters.

Had British voters been told about such predictable economic benefits instead of being lied to, there would have been a landslide for Brexit.

Even Scotland would have signed up.

Crucially, we now have a chance to look at the mess we are leaving behind — and the real case against Mr Osborne’s political and economic judgement.

From his perch at the Treasury, the Chancellor knew Europe was in deep, deep trouble.

Economic policy was doomed from outset

Near-criminal levels of unemployment, double the UK rate, have destroyed the life chances of millions of jobless under-24s, the human casualties of the euro tragedy.

Growth across the EU is half Britain’s and zero — zilch — in increasingly stricken France.
The Eurozone, with its one-size-fits-all economic policy, was doomed from the outset.

Its keystone policy, the free movement of people, has unleashed an irreversible Islamic threat to the social fabric and security of the Continent of Europe.

What nobody knew, but many of us feared, was how global political bodies were complicit in supporting this jerry-built monstrosity at the expense of more deserving countries.

The French-dominated International Monetary Fund stands accused by its own watchdog of “complacently” squandering its cash propping up what amounts to a condemned building.

It wilfully ignored the risk from bust Italian banks and ignored Greece’s unaffordable debt and corruption.

“This lapse was largely due to the IMF’s readiness to take the reassurances of national and euro area authorities at face value,” the watchdog says.

In fact, the scandal-plagued IMF has invariably acted as a Brussels lapdog while looking out for French national interests.

It was led by orgy-loving Dominique Strauss-Kahn until he left in disgrace to be replaced by his fellow French politician Lagarde, who is now facing trial over a £350m political funding scandal.

George Osborne, who promoted Ms Lagarde’s appointment as IMF chief in 2011, went into the referendum with his eyes wide open.

Trying to lock us into such a corrupt political shambles by fair means or foul is no qualification for a Companion of Honour.