GEORGE Osborne, the chancellor, and his colleagues, assure us that we will be financially better off if we stay within, rather than out, of the EU.

It is prediction and an opinion.

How are we to determine if they will be right or wrong?

We can say with certainty what the past situation has been.

The IMF historical financial data shows that, over the past few decades, we were most unlikely to have been better off being within the EU.

To conclude that we were better off “in” would be to conclude that we are less capable than countries such as Canada and Australia.

The EU economies have grown significantly more slowly than their counterparts outside the EU and their current, 2015, standards of living, on a financial basis, are significantly lower.

The values being: growth, since 1980, 30.6 per cent lower and standard of living, 12.4 per cent lower.

Also it is telling that not once has the chancellor referred to past performance in support of predictions.

If you wish to verify these facts, the best place to start is the Knoema website where the bare data is presented, without comment, for the 200-plus countries of the world.

Look at GDP PPP values to determine growth and GDP per capita PPP for standard of living.

Why the chancellor and his colleagues predict that the next 35 years or more – that’s what we’re voting for – will be so different to the past 35 years, they have yet to explain.

Ron Crumpler

Upper Leazes