Top ten political gaffes of 2013: 5 – George ‘Munchies’ Osborne

The chancellor regards Twitter as a vehicle to demonstrate he is human rather than a cutting merciless cyborg Treasury monster.

So a late-night picture of him chomping on a burger should have been just the trick. What could be more endearing than this?

It isn't, but Osborne's meal of burger and chips looks like a crude attempt to prove "we're all in this together" pic.twitter.com/tu7r7zlWAM

Featured

BASC given permission to bring judicial review of Defra decision

Featured

Concern over doctors’ health needs as legislation to regulate PAs and AAs introduced

— George Eaton (@georgeeaton) June 25, 2013

The problem, it emerged, was that the burger in question was not a Maccie Ds, or even a Burger King. It was a Byron Burger which cost an eye-watering £9.75. Twitter judged this to be evidence that the chancellor is himself 'posh', and certainly not a man of the people.

"I was working late on a speech and I had a hamburger and the world is now talking about it," he moaned the following morning. When communities secretary Eric Pickles responded with a picture of himself eating a salad, Osborne would have surely realised the joke was on him.

Ha, no posh burger for you then, Mr Pickles… RT @EricPickles: Putting final touches to the LGA speech #lgaconf13 pic.twitter.com/vXMbyZTZig

— Mike Gladstone (@mikeglad) June 27, 2013

Click here for number four in our list – from the most important, and/or forgetful, man in Britain…