From here in Norway we just look across the North Sea to see the same foolishness in the UK. The UK just wasted the North Sea oil, none of it was invested for the future. Of course the UK has 15 times the population of Norway so an oil fund would not have the same impact on the population but it would surely have helped a lot to cushion the country against the bad times. But I think the Norwegian experience is hard to export; solidarity and a social conscience are much more popular here than in many other countries. Large numbers of people here, including politicians, really do believe that "We are all in it together".

No, it's not paradise, but with continued vigilance it can go a long way towards it.