Aberdeenshire Licensing Board - The Moray Council: Fill & Download for Free

Along with other policies it was helped to turn the UK from the sick man of Europe to one of the largest economies on earth.UK now:Think of the context - North Sea oil - WikipediaThe UK Continental Shelf Act came into force in May 1964. Seismic exploration and the first well followed later that year. It and a second well on the Mid North Sea High were dry, as the Rotliegendes was absent, but BP's Sea Gem rig struck gas in the West Sole Field in September 1965.The celebrations were short-lived since the Sea Gem sank, with the loss of 13 lives, after part of the rig collapsed as it was moved away from the discovery well.The Viking Gas Field was discovered in December 1965 with the Conoco/National Coal Board well 49/17-1, finding the gas-bearing PermianRotliegend Sandstone at a depth of 2,756 m subsea.Helicopters were first used to transport workers.Larger gas finds followed in 1966—Leman Bank, Indefatigable and Hewett, but by 1968 companies had lost interest in further exploration of the British sector, a result of a ban on gas exports and low prices offered by the only buyer, British Gas. West Sole came onstream in May 1967.Licensing regulations for Dutch waters were not finalised until 1967.The situation was transformed in December 1969, when Phillips Petroleum discovered oil in Chalk of Danian age at Ekofisk, in Norwegian waters in the central North Sea.The same month, Amoco discovered the Montrose Field about 217 km (135 mi) east of Aberdeen.BP had been awarded several licences in the area in the second licensing round late in 1965, but had been reluctant to work on them.The discovery of Ekofisk prompted them to drill what turned out to be a dry hole in May 1970, followed by the discovery of the giant Forties Oil Field in October 1970.The following year, Shell Expro discovered the giant Brent oilfield in the northern North Sea east of Shetland in Scotland and the Petronord Group discovered the Frigg gas field. The Piper oilfield was discovered in 1973 and the Statfjord Field and the Ninian Fieldin 1974, with the Ninian reservoir consisting of Middle Jurassic sandstones at a depth of 3000 m subsea in a "westward tilted horst block".Off shore production, like that of the North Sea, became more economical after the 1973 oil crisis caused the world oil price to quadruple, followed by the 1979 oil crisis, causing another tripling in the oil price. Oil production started from the Argyll & Duncan Oilfields (now the Ardmore) in June 1975 followed by Forties Oil Field in November of that year.The inner Moray Firth Beatrice Field, a Jurassic sandstone/shale reservoir 1829 m deep in a "fault-bounded anticlinal trap", was discovered in 1976 with well 11/30-1, drilled by the Mesa Petroleum Group (named after T. Boone Pickens' wife Bea, "the only oil field in the North Sea named for a woman") in 49 m of water.So it would have been the 1970s before the UK could have considered a Sovereign Wealth Fund based on oil.Was this failure due to the UK being a Western Capitalist country?What short memories the left seem to have.Britain’s Socialist Seventies | National ReviewBut if Britain fails to remember the 1970s, it may soon find itself in a place where it really should not want to be. Towards the end of the latter, infinitely less entertaining decade, a good number of those at the top of Jeremy Corbyn’s opposition Labour party made their political debut as members of a hard Left that was far less of a fringe than it deserved to be.In 1962, former secretary of state Dean Acheson told a West Point audience that Britain had “lost an empire” but “not yet found a role.” By the early 1970s it had found one as Europe’s latest sick man, made sicker still by new Irish woes. In 1960 the U.K. boasted Europe’s most productive economy. Within ten years it had been overtaken by all its major peers. Repeated pressure on its (overvalued) currency signaled that the U.K. was living beyond its means. While Britain’s failure to keep up can be partly explained by improving conditions for some of its competitors — a post-war rebound in some cases, long-term laggards pulling themselves together in others — much of the blame was to be found at home. Complacency, systematic underinvestment, mounting trade-union militancy, and (after a Labour government took over in 1964) ever higher levels of taxation and government intervention in an economy already burdened by too much of both, all took their toll.The mid Seventies were hard on most Western economies, but the U.K. appeared to be in a hell of its own. Inflation shot up from over 9 percent in 1973 to more than 24 percent two years later, GDP fell, unemployment rose, the pound crumbled, the stock market crashed, house prices slumped, industry buckled, and some of Britain’s best and brightest headed for the exit. In response and with a good degree of union support, Labour’s left, including a minister who later would become a mentor of sorts to a young Jeremy Corbyn, agitated for more taxes, more spending, more state control of the economy, and something close to autarky.In other words quite simply the UK needed the money to improve the current situation.Was that money then used wisely once the Western Capitalists got a hold of it? Yes.How Thatcher brought UK back from the wildernessLady Thatcher came to power when Britain was the “sick man of Europe” and administered tough medicine with radical consequences. Free markets, privatisations, Big Bang and a refusal to support failing industries were the core of her political philosophy.Back then, people had to wait six months to get a telephone, were banned from taking more than £50 abroad and were at the mercy of union leaders for jobs.The economy was crippled by rampant inflation, punitive taxes and a 98pc levy on investment income that crushed entrepreneurial initiative. In 1977, Britain had to accept a handout from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), like Greece or Cyprus today.A total of 29m working days were lost to strikes in 1979, compared with 2m in 1990. Power cuts were standard and industries were limited to a three-day working week to conserve energy. The candle was almost a unit of currency.Between 1984 and 1991, 33 major companies were privatised in what the old guard, such as Harold MacMillan, called “selling off the family silver”.Associated British Ports, British Airports Authority, British Airways, British Gas, British Steel, British Telecom, 17 electricity companies and 10 water and sewerage companies left public ownership.According to the Centre for Policy Studies (CPS), the state companies went from costing the Treasury an average of £300m each a year in subsidies to contributing between £3.3bn and £5.8bn a year in corporation tax from 1987 onwards.British Steel needed £1bn of Treasury support in 1980 on a turnover of £3bn, earning itself a place in the Guinness Book of Records for inefficiency. Soon after privatisation it was profitable and contributing £200m a year in taxes.British Telecom had a £300m cash injection in 1980; in 1995 it paid £1.1bn to the Exchequer.The consumer also benefited. By 1995, domestic gas prices fell 25pc and commercial gas costs were 50pc lower. Telecoms charges fell by 40pc and airport charges dropped 10pc.Lady Thatcher was far from perfect and made plenty of mistakes. But as the economist Roger Bootle said: “In assessing Mrs Thatcher’s economic legacy, I can do no better than quote the following, which is a translation of the Latin words inscribed on the floor underneath the dome of St Paul’s Cathedral in relation to Sir Christopher Wren: 'Reader, if you seek his monument, look around you’.”Look around you (well at this video)Would an oil fund have been a better option? We can’t tell but Norway is often looked at as an example.VITENBERG: Norway’s shame: How a nation squandered its oil richesSome 50 years ago, Njord, the mythological Norsk god of wealth, smiled on the hardworking fishermen and lumberjacks, and presented Norway with the gift of oil. In financial terms, this was a handsome gift indeed, currently translated into a natural bounty worth $740 billion.The country’s 2013 election campaign spawned a debate about the government’s management of the massive Norwegian Oil Fund. Norwegian citizens, however, have been trapped within a virtual bubble: Far from raising and discussing serious concerns, the debate in which the country has been engaged is fundamentally flawed. Behind the rosy picture that Norway’s leaders have painted of the country’s economy lie some difficult truths. We have only to chip away a little at this bright facade to realize that a far less glittering reality lies beneath the surface.First, the oil fund is a mathematical artifice. At three-quarters of a trillion dollars, the Norwegian Oil Fundappears to provide plenty for a country with scarcely 5 million citizens. Yet the country has accumulated a foreign debt that, at $657 billion, is almost as massive. Subtracting the debt from the fund’s $740 billion leaves a balance of only $83 billion. In other words, there is a treasure chest, but it is almost empty: Njord’s prize for future generations is only a little more than 10 percent of its putative value.Even if we take the fund’s worth at face value, its future is not guaranteed. In a 2011 analysis, “What Does Norway Get Out Of Its Oil Fund, if Not More Strategic Infrastructure Investment?” University of Missouri economist and Wall Street financial analyst Michael Hudson offered a stark assessment: The Norwegian oilmonies are invested mainly in the unstable economies of Brazil, Russia, India and China, or in volatile real estate in the West.The Norwegian people are understandably proud of the massive nest egg they think they possess. The truth hidden from ordinary Norwegians is that much of the country’s oil bounty has already been squandered. If Norway is to avoid being drawn inexorably into the abyss, it must fundamentally reassess its policies and learn the lessons of the global developments that have affected the world of finance and real estate since the 1960s.After 50 years of complacency, time is now working against the Norwegian people. Njord is no longer smiling on them, but will they notice?I see a commentator to another answer mentions the Alberta oil fund, and Alberta isn’t a country, the UK does have something similar.The Shetland DividendI've been making a BBC Radio Scotland programme looking at "The Shetland Dividend" - about how it got some of the oil wealth for itself, and has put it aside into two funds which have been invested and grown to more than £200m each.Not greedy, perhaps, but very significant for a population of 22,000. I've been looking at how the islanders are using that wealth, and what leverage its given the islands in the independence debate.On my recent visit to Shetland to make this programme (and another on theislands' businesses), I heard of the astonishment that mainlanders hadn't learned from the extraordinary deal done between the islands council and the oil companies - a negotiation in which the industry majors "grossly under-estimated" the Shetland negotiating team.A veteran watcher of the relationship, Alastair Cooper, now a councillor with Sullom Voe in his ward, says he can't believe Aberdeen and Aberdeenshire failed to push for similar community benefits.That said, the smart, tough negotiations led by Ian Clarke, chief executive of the Shetland Islands Council in the 1970s (long since retired, and now living in Campbeltown) were not so smart as to see beyond 2000, when it was assumed the oil would have run out. So that's when the payments stopped.I also learned that Sheltand's oil fund hasn't been without its unexpected challenges.For those who say the UK should have done as Norway did, Shetland offers contrasting lessons.Shetlanders are spending the wealth on themselves, investing in their own industries. They have one of the lowest council tax rates in Scotland.But for all the reproaches that Britain should have done the same, it's been hard to find anyone in Britain in the past four decades arguing for the high taxes, deliberately slowed offshore development and the budgetary self-denial that have been part of the story.

Think of the context - North Sea oil - WikipediaThe UK Continental Shelf Act came into force in May 1964. Seismic exploration and the first well followed later that year. It and a second well on the Mid North Sea High were dry, as the Rotliegendes was absent, but BP's Sea Gem rig struck gas in the West Sole Field in September 1965.The celebrations were short-lived since the Sea Gem sank, with the loss of 13 lives, after part of the rig collapsed as it was moved away from the discovery well.The Viking Gas Field was discovered in December 1965 with the Conoco/National Coal Board well 49/17-1, finding the gas-bearing Permian Rotliegend Sandstone at a depth of 2,756 m subsea.Helicopters were first used to transport workers.Larger gas finds followed in 1966—Leman Bank, Indefatigable and Hewett, but by 1968 companies had lost interest in further exploration of the British sector, a result of a ban on gas exports and low prices offered by the only buyer, British Gas. West Sole came onstream in May 1967.Licensing regulations for Dutch waters were not finalised until 1967.The situation was transformed in December 1969, when Phillips Petroleum discovered oil in Chalk of Danian age at Ekofisk, in Norwegian waters in the central North Sea.The same month, Amoco discovered the Montrose Field about 217 km (135 mi) east of Aberdeen.BP had been awarded several licences in the area in the second licensing round late in 1965, but had been reluctant to work on them.The discovery of Ekofisk prompted them to drill what turned out to be a dry hole in May 1970, followed by the discovery of the giant Forties Oil Field in October 1970.The following year, Shell Expro discovered the giant Brent oilfield in the northern North Sea east of Shetland in Scotland and the Petronord Group discovered the Frigg gas field. The Piper oilfield was discovered in 1973 and the Statfjord Field and the Ninian Fieldin 1974, with the Ninian reservoir consisting of Middle Jurassic sandstones at a depth of 3000 m subsea in a "westward tilted horst block".Off shore production, like that of the North Sea, became more economical after the 1973 oil crisis caused the world oil price to quadruple, followed by the 1979 oil crisis, causing another tripling in the oil price. Oil production started from the Argyll & Duncan Oilfields (now the Ardmore) in June 1975 followed by Forties Oil Field in November of that year.The inner Moray Firth Beatrice Field, a Jurassic sandstone/shale reservoir 1829 m deep in a "fault-bounded anticlinal trap", was discovered in 1976 with well 11/30-1, drilled by the Mesa Petroleum Group (named after T. Boone Pickens' wife Bea, "the only oil field in the North Sea named for a woman") in 49 m of water.So it would have been the 1970s before the UK could have considered a Sovereign Wealth Fund based on oil.Was this failure due to the UK being a Western Capitalist country?What short memories the left seem to have.Britain’s Socialist Seventies | National ReviewBut if Britain fails to remember the 1970s, it may soon find itself in a place where it really should not want to be. Towards the end of the latter, infinitely less entertaining decade, a good number of those at the top of Jeremy Corbyn’s opposition Labour party made their political debut as members of a hard Left that was far less of a fringe than it deserved to be.In 1962, former secretary of state Dean Acheson told a West Point audience that Britain had “lost an empire” but “not yet found a role.” By the early 1970s it had found one as Europe’s latest sick man, made sicker still by new Irish woes. In 1960 the U.K. boasted Europe’s most productive economy. Within ten years it had been overtaken by all its major peers. Repeated pressure on its (overvalued) currency signaled that the U.K. was living beyond its means. While Britain’s failure to keep up can be partly explained by improving conditions for some of its competitors — a post-war rebound in some cases, long-term laggards pulling themselves together in others — much of the blame was to be found at home. Complacency, systematic underinvestment, mounting trade-union militancy, and (after a Labour government took over in 1964) ever higher levels of taxation and government intervention in an economy already burdened by too much of both, all took their toll.The mid Seventies were hard on most Western economies, but the U.K. appeared to be in a hell of its own. Inflation shot up from over 9 percent in 1973 to more than 24 percent two years later, GDP fell, unemployment rose, the pound crumbled, the stock market crashed, house prices slumped, industry buckled, and some of Britain’s best and brightest headed for the exit. In response and with a good degree of union support, Labour’s left, including a minister who later would become a mentor of sorts to a young Jeremy Corbyn, agitated for more taxes, more spending, more state control of the economy, and something close to autarky.In other words quite simply the UK needed the money to improve the current situation.Was that money then used wisely once the Western Capitalists got a hold of it? Yes.How Thatcher brought UK back from the wildernessLady Thatcher came to power when Britain was the “sick man of Europe” and administered tough medicine with radical consequences. Free markets, privatisations, Big Bang and a refusal to support failing industries were the core of her political philosophy.Back then, people had to wait six months to get a telephone, were banned from taking more than £50 abroad and were at the mercy of union leaders for jobs.The economy was crippled by rampant inflation, punitive taxes and a 98pc levy on investment income that crushed entrepreneurial initiative. In 1977, Britain had to accept a handout from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), like Greece or Cyprus today.A total of 29m working days were lost to strikes in 1979, compared with 2m in 1990. Power cuts were standard and industries were limited to a three-day working week to conserve energy. The candle was almost a unit of currency.Between 1984 and 1991, 33 major companies were privatised in what the old guard, such as Harold MacMillan, called “selling off the family silver”.Associated British Ports, British Airports Authority, British Airways, British Gas, British Steel, British Telecom, 17 electricity companies and 10 water and sewerage companies left public ownership.According to the Centre for Policy Studies (CPS), the state companies went from costing the Treasury an average of £300m each a year in subsidies to contributing between £3.3bn and £5.8bn a year in corporation tax from 1987 onwards.British Steel needed £1bn of Treasury support in 1980 on a turnover of £3bn, earning itself a place in the Guinness Book of Records for inefficiency. Soon after privatisation it was profitable and contributing £200m a year in taxes.British Telecom had a £300m cash injection in 1980; in 1995 it paid £1.1bn to the Exchequer.The consumer also benefited. By 1995, domestic gas prices fell 25pc and commercial gas costs were 50pc lower. Telecoms charges fell by 40pc and airport charges dropped 10pc.Lady Thatcher was far from perfect and made plenty of mistakes. But as the economist Roger Bootle said: “In assessing Mrs Thatcher’s economic legacy, I can do no better than quote the following, which is a translation of the Latin words inscribed on the floor underneath the dome of St Paul’s Cathedral in relation to Sir Christopher Wren: 'Reader, if you seek his monument, look around you’.”Look around you (well at this video)Would an oil fund have been a better option? We can’t tell but Norway is often looked at as an example.VITENBERG: Norway’s shame: How a nation squandered its oil richesSome 50 years ago, Njord, the mythological Norsk god of wealth, smiled on the hardworking fishermen and lumberjacks, and presented Norway with the gift of oil. In financial terms, this was a handsome gift indeed, currently translated into a natural bounty worth $740 billion.The country’s 2013 election campaign spawned a debate about the government’s management of the massive Norwegian Oil Fund. Norwegian citizens, however, have been trapped within a virtual bubble: Far from raising and discussing serious concerns, the debate in which the country has been engaged is fundamentally flawed. Behind the rosy picture that Norway’s leaders have painted of the country’s economy lie some difficult truths. We have only to chip away a little at this bright facade to realize that a far less glittering reality lies beneath the surface.First, the oil fund is a mathematical artifice. At three-quarters of a trillion dollars, the Norwegian Oil Fundappears to provide plenty for a country with scarcely 5 million citizens. Yet the country has accumulated a foreign debt that, at $657 billion, is almost as massive. Subtracting the debt from the fund’s $740 billion leaves a balance of only $83 billion. In other words, there is a treasure chest, but it is almost empty: Njord’s prize for future generations is only a little more than 10 percent of its putative value.Even if we take the fund’s worth at face value, its future is not guaranteed. In a 2011 analysis, “What Does Norway Get Out Of Its Oil Fund, if Not More Strategic Infrastructure Investment?” University of Missouri economist and Wall Street financial analyst Michael Hudson offered a stark assessment: The Norwegian oil monies are invested mainly in the unstable economies of Brazil, Russia, India and China, or in volatile real estate in the West.The Norwegian people are understandably proud of the massive nest egg they think they possess. The truth hidden from ordinary Norwegians is that much of the country’s oil bounty has already been squandered. If Norway is to avoid being drawn inexorably into the abyss, it must fundamentally reassess its policies and learn the lessons of the global developments that have affected the world of finance and real estate since the 1960s.After 50 years of complacency, time is now working against the Norwegian people. Njord is no longer smiling on them, but will they notice?I see a commentator to another answer mentions the Alberta oil fund, and Alberta isn’t a country, the UK does have something similar.The Shetland DividendI've been making a BBC Radio Scotland programme looking at "The Shetland Dividend" - about how it got some of the oil wealth for itself, and has put it aside into two funds which have been invested and grown to more than £200m each.Not greedy, perhaps, but very significant for a population of 22,000. I've been looking at how the islanders are using that wealth, and what leverage its given the islands in the independence debate.On my recent visit to Shetland to make this programme (and another on theislands' businesses), I heard of the astonishment that mainlanders hadn't learned from the extraordinary deal done between the islands council and the oil companies - a negotiation in which the industry majors "grossly under-estimated" the Shetland negotiating team.A veteran watcher of the relationship, Alastair Cooper, now a councillor with Sullom Voe in his ward, says he can't believe Aberdeen and Aberdeenshire failed to push for similar community benefits.That said, the smart, tough negotiations led by Ian Clarke, chief executive of the Shetland Islands Council in the 1970s (long since retired, and now living in Campbeltown) were not so smart as to see beyond 2000, when it was assumed the oil would have run out. So that's when the payments stopped.I also learned that Sheltand's oil fund hasn't been without its unexpected challenges.For those who say the UK should have done as Norway did, Shetland offers contrasting lessons.Shetlanders are spending the wealth on themselves, investing in their own industries. They have one of the lowest council tax rates in Scotland.But for all the reproaches that Britain should have done the same, it's been hard to find anyone in Britain in the past four decades arguing for the high taxes, deliberately slowed offshore development and the budgetary self-denial that have been part of the story.

Exactly what Mrs T (and also the Labour government prior to Mrs T) did.The Shetland DividendBut with the economy in dire straits, following the 1976 bailout by the IMF, the Treasury argued an oil fund couldn't be afforded, recalls McCrone. As usual, the Treasury won.Before long, a new government had taken power, led by Margaret Thatcher.The left love to blame Thatcher but it was a very socialist government that also decided against a Sovereign Wealth Fund.Think of the context - North Sea oil - WikipediaThe UK Continental Shelf Act came into force in May 1964. Seismic exploration and the first well followed later that year. It and a second well on the Mid North Sea High were dry, as the Rotliegendes was absent, but BP's Sea Gem rig struck gas in the West Sole Field in September 1965.The celebrations were short-lived since the Sea Gem sank, with the loss of 13 lives, after part of the rig collapsed as it was moved away from the discovery well.The Viking Gas Field was discovered in December 1965 with the Conoco/National Coal Board well 49/17-1, finding the gas-bearing PermianRotliegend Sandstone at a depth of 2,756 m subsea.Helicopters were first used to transport workers.Larger gas finds followed in 1966—Leman Bank, Indefatigable and Hewett, but by 1968 companies had lost interest in further exploration of the British sector, a result of a ban on gas exports and low prices offered by the only buyer, British Gas. West Sole came onstream in May 1967.Licensing regulations for Dutch waters were not finalised until 1967.The situation was transformed in December 1969, when Phillips Petroleum discovered oil in Chalk of Danian age at Ekofisk, in Norwegian waters in the central North Sea.The same month, Amoco discovered the Montrose Field about 217 km (135 mi) east of Aberdeen.BP had been awarded several licences in the area in the second licensing round late in 1965, but had been reluctant to work on them.The discovery of Ekofisk prompted them to drill what turned out to be a dry hole in May 1970, followed by the discovery of the giant Forties Oil Field in October 1970.The following year, Shell Expro discovered the giant Brent oilfield in the northern North Sea east of Shetland in Scotland and the Petronord Group discovered the Frigg gas field. The Piper oilfield was discovered in 1973 and the Statfjord Field and the Ninian Fieldin 1974, with the Ninian reservoir consisting of Middle Jurassic sandstones at a depth of 3000 m subsea in a "westward tilted horst block".Off shore production, like that of the North Sea, became more economical after the 1973 oil crisis caused the world oil price to quadruple, followed by the 1979 oil crisis, causing another tripling in the oil price. Oil production started from the Argyll & Duncan Oilfields (now the Ardmore) in June 1975 followed by Forties Oil Field in November of that year.The inner Moray Firth Beatrice Field, a Jurassic sandstone/shale reservoir 1829 m deep in a "fault-bounded anticlinal trap", was discovered in 1976 with well 11/30-1, drilled by the Mesa Petroleum Group (named after T. Boone Pickens' wife Bea, "the only oil field in the North Sea named for a woman") in 49 m of water.So it would have been the 1970s before the UK could have considered a Sovereign Wealth Fund based on oil.Was this failure due to the UK being a Western Capitalist country?What short memories the left seem to have.Britain’s Socialist Seventies | National ReviewBut if Britain fails to remember the 1970s, it may soon find itself in a place where it really should not want to be. Towards the end of the latter, infinitely less entertaining decade, a good number of those at the top of Jeremy Corbyn’s opposition Labour party made their political debut as members of a hard Left that was far less of a fringe than it deserved to be.In 1962, former secretary of state Dean Acheson told a West Point audience that Britain had “lost an empire” but “not yet found a role.” By the early 1970s it had found one as Europe’s latest sick man, made sicker still by new Irish woes. In 1960 the U.K. boasted Europe’s most productive economy. Within ten years it had been overtaken by all its major peers. Repeated pressure on its (overvalued) currency signaled that the U.K. was living beyond its means. While Britain’s failure to keep up can be partly explained by improving conditions for some of its competitors — a post-war rebound in some cases, long-term laggards pulling themselves together in others — much of the blame was to be found at home. Complacency, systematic underinvestment, mounting trade-union militancy, and (after a Labour government took over in 1964) ever higher levels of taxation and government intervention in an economy already burdened by too much of both, all took their toll.The mid Seventies were hard on most Western economies, but the U.K. appeared to be in a hell of its own. Inflation shot up from over 9 percent in 1973 to more than 24 percent two years later, GDP fell, unemployment rose, the pound crumbled, the stock market crashed, house prices slumped, industry buckled, and some of Britain’s best and brightest headed for the exit. In response and with a good degree of union support, Labour’s left, including a minister who later would become a mentor of sorts to a young Jeremy Corbyn, agitated for more taxes, more spending, more state control of the economy, and something close to autarky.In other words quite simply the UK needed the money to improve the current situation.Was that money then used wisely once the Western Capitalists got a hold of it? Yes.How Thatcher brought UK back from the wildernessLady Thatcher came to power when Britain was the “sick man of Europe” and administered tough medicine with radical consequences. Free markets, privatisations, Big Bang and a refusal to support failing industries were the core of her political philosophy.Back then, people had to wait six months to get a telephone, were banned from taking more than £50 abroad and were at the mercy of union leaders for jobs.The economy was crippled by rampant inflation, punitive taxes and a 98pc levy on investment income that crushed entrepreneurial initiative. In 1977, Britain had to accept a handout from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), like Greece or Cyprus today.A total of 29m working days were lost to strikes in 1979, compared with 2m in 1990. Power cuts were standard and industries were limited to a three-day working week to conserve energy. The candle was almost a unit of currency.Between 1984 and 1991, 33 major companies were privatised in what the old guard, such as Harold MacMillan, called “selling off the family silver”.Associated British Ports, British Airports Authority, British Airways, British Gas, British Steel, British Telecom, 17 electricity companies and 10 water and sewerage companies left public ownership.According to the Centre for Policy Studies (CPS), the state companies went from costing the Treasury an average of £300m each a year in subsidies to contributing between £3.3bn and £5.8bn a year in corporation tax from 1987 onwards.British Steel needed £1bn of Treasury support in 1980 on a turnover of £3bn, earning itself a place in the Guinness Book of Records for inefficiency. Soon after privatisation it was profitable and contributing £200m a year in taxes.British Telecom had a £300m cash injection in 1980; in 1995 it paid £1.1bn to the Exchequer.The consumer also benefited. By 1995, domestic gas prices fell 25pc and commercial gas costs were 50pc lower. Telecoms charges fell by 40pc and airport charges dropped 10pc.Lady Thatcher was far from perfect and made plenty of mistakes. But as the economist Roger Bootle said: “In assessing Mrs Thatcher’s economic legacy, I can do no better than quote the following, which is a translation of the Latin words inscribed on the floor underneath the dome of St Paul’s Cathedral in relation to Sir Christopher Wren: 'Reader, if you seek his monument, look around you’.”Look around you (well at this video)Would an oil fund have been a better option? We can’t tell but Norway is often looked at as an example.VITENBERG: Norway’s shame: How a nation squandered its oil richesSome 50 years ago, Njord, the mythological Norsk god of wealth, smiled on the hardworking fishermen and lumberjacks, and presented Norway with the gift of oil. In financial terms, this was a handsome gift indeed, currently translated into a natural bounty worth $740 billion.The country’s 2013 election campaign spawned a debate about the government’s management of the massive Norwegian Oil Fund. Norwegian citizens, however, have been trapped within a virtual bubble: Far from raising and discussing serious concerns, the debate in which the country has been engaged is fundamentally flawed. Behind the rosy picture that Norway’s leaders have painted of the country’s economy lie some difficult truths. We have only to chip away a little at this bright facade to realize that a far less glittering reality lies beneath the surface.First, the oil fund is a mathematical artifice. At three-quarters of a trillion dollars, the Norwegian Oil Fundappears to provide plenty for a country with scarcely 5 million citizens. Yet the country has accumulated a foreign debt that, at $657 billion, is almost as massive. Subtracting the debt from the fund’s $740 billion leaves a balance of only $83 billion. In other words, there is a treasure chest, but it is almost empty: Njord’s prize for future generations is only a little more than 10 percent of its putative value.Even if we take the fund’s worth at face value, its future is not guaranteed. In a 2011 analysis, “What Does Norway Get Out Of Its Oil Fund, if Not More Strategic Infrastructure Investment?” University of Missouri economist and Wall Street financial analyst Michael Hudson offered a stark assessment: The Norwegian oilmonies are invested mainly in the unstable economies of Brazil, Russia, India and China, or in volatile real estate in the West.The Norwegian people are understandably proud of the massive nest egg they think they possess. The truth hidden from ordinary Norwegians is that much of the country’s oil bounty has already been squandered. If Norway is to avoid being drawn inexorably into the abyss, it must fundamentally reassess its policies and learn the lessons of the global developments that have affected the world of finance and real estate since the 1960s.After 50 years of complacency, time is now working against the Norwegian people. Njord is no longer smiling on them, but will they notice?I see a commentator to another answer mentions the Alberta oil fund, and Alberta isn’t a country, the UK does have something similar.The Shetland DividendI've been making a BBC Radio Scotland programme looking at "The Shetland Dividend" - about how it got some of the oil wealth for itself, and has put it aside into two funds which have been invested and grown to more than £200m each.Not greedy, perhaps, but very significant for a population of 22,000. I've been looking at how the islanders are using that wealth, and what leverage its given the islands in the independence debate.On my recent visit to Shetland to make this programme (and another on theislands' businesses), I heard of the astonishment that mainlanders hadn't learned from the extraordinary deal done between the islands council and the oil companies - a negotiation in which the industry majors "grossly under-estimated" the Shetland negotiating team.A veteran watcher of the relationship, Alastair Cooper, now a councillor with Sullom Voe in his ward, says he can't believe Aberdeen and Aberdeenshire failed to push for similar community benefits.That said, the smart, tough negotiations led by Ian Clarke, chief executive of the Shetland Islands Council in the 1970s (long since retired, and now living in Campbeltown) were not so smart as to see beyond 2000, when it was assumed the oil would have run out. So that's when the payments stopped.I also learned that Sheltand's oil fund hasn't been without its unexpected challenges.For those who say the UK should have done as Norway did, Shetland offers contrasting lessons.Shetlanders are spending the wealth on themselves, investing in their own industries. They have one of the lowest council tax rates in Scotland.But for all the reproaches that Britain should have done the same, it's been hard to find anyone in Britain in the past four decades arguing for the high taxes, deliberately slowed offshore development and the budgetary self-denial that have been part of the story.