Let’s put aside the infighting, for a moment. Let’s suppose the Labour Party isn’t preoccupied with internal wrangles. What should we, as a party, be doing? A smart party might be looking at why we lost the 2015 election, and what we can learn from it. Let’s proceed in that spirit. Survey after survey tells us that one of the key reasons Labour lost in May was the economy.

We were not, and are not, trusted to be in charge of the nation’s finances. We have to accept that this is both true and important. Economic credibility is absolutely critical for a party which aspires to govern. We didn’t have it, and the Conservatives did. So, what now?

Where have we been, economically, for the last five years? Well, mostly we’ve been highlighting the immorality of Tory cuts. The proliferation of food banks. The people who died after sanctions from the DWP. Public sector pay freezes. And of course, in this parliament, the proposed tax credit cuts.

There is nothing wrong with any of this. It is right to oppose these things, and there is value in raising awareness of what the Conservatives are doing.

But it is not enough.

It is not enough for Labour to merely oppose everything and simply appeal to altruism. Apart from anything else, it hasn’t proved electorally successful. Five years of opposition to Conservative cuts and we are still not trusted on the economy. Why not?

It seems likely that the public do recognise that Conservatives may be mean-spirited, but support them nonetheless. Perhaps voters tolerate the cuts if they feel that the Tories have a good reason to act as they do, and if they believe the policies are being carried out competently. The electorate may prefer a party that has a solid plan of what to do over a party that they see as offering nothing but howls of protest, uncosted spending plans, and a reluctance to ever make difficult choices. Altruism alone will not win elections.

So, what should Labour do about all this? As I see it, there are two strands here. The first is to come up with a new economic blueprint for how we want to run the country; different to Conservative cuts and privatising, but also something away from just throwing money at every problem. I wrote a post recently with some proposals on this point, but it is important to begin making a positive case for greater and smarter investment; the recent floods providing a classic example of how Tory cuts in the short-term can harm the country in the long-term.

So that’s the first part; construct a new economic vision. The second strand is the easy bit. We need to demolish George Osborne’s reputation.

Boooooo etc

George Osborne has to become our main target. As the chancellor, he has been, and remains, the architect of the Conservative economy, cuts and all. His fingerprints are all over everything this government does, and it is his axe that hacks away at public services we hold dear. He, more than anyone else, embodies the ideology we need to defeat. Further, there is a decent chance that he will be the Tory Prime Minister going into the 2020 election, and he must be held to account for what he has done as chancellor.

The opposition to him over recent years has been almost non-existent, fêted as he has been by a largely pliant media who are all too keen to project him as a political mastermind. Labour have wasted their own opportunities to attack him too; consider the Autumn Statement, an occasion which could have been challenging for Osborne, but was instead overshadowed by John McDonnell’s Little Red Error. We are the official opposition, and it is our job to change the narrative.

Here’s what we need to say about George Osborne. He is incompetent, and he is duplicitous.

On competence: The deficit reduction targets he set out in 2010 were missed by miles. How, we should ask, can we trust a chancellor who got his sums so wrong? He will breach the welfare cap that he himself introduced. And, back in 2009, he warned of the humiliation Britain would face if it lost its AAA credit rating, which duly happened under his watch in 2013. George Osborne’s record as chancellor is one of failure, even on his own stated terms. Why are we not shouting this from the rooftops?

On duplicity: In the Autumn Statement Osborne made his tax credits U-turn, which he used to underline his pragmatism and willingness to listen. Looking at the small print since then, it is clear that these cuts will still happen in a different guise when universal credit is introduced. This is fundamentally dishonest. He also failed to announce in his statement a significant change to student loan repayments, which will apply retrospectively, and will hit recent graduates hard. To great fanfare earlier in the year, he announced a living wage that is too low to live on. Finally, despite his insistence that cuts are necessary and must be undertaken as a matter of urgency, money has been found for the Syria campaign without any problem.

Here is a chancellor who says one thing and does another; one who tries to disguise his actions by hiding them, or by only telling half the story.

We need to talk about these things more than the manifest unfairness of Conservative politics. But it’s no good doing this sporadically, or in the run-up to an election. We need to be talking about George Osborne’s incompetence and dishonesty constantly; every shadow minister should be talking about it in every single interview.

The only way Labour can change the prevailing narrative is slowly, by hammering home the same points, simply, clearly and often. Don’t ever forget, this is what the Conservatives did to us in 2010, repeatedly telling the country that the financial crisis was our fault while we chose a new leader. If we’re serious about winning in 2020, Osborne’s failures and deceits are a theme we need to establish, rather than just giving him an easy time of it.

If I could choose one New Year’s Resolution for the Labour Party, it would be this: attack George Osborne, at every opportunity.