The cover of the currentissueof Private Eye, a fortnightly satiricalmagazine, showscarsablazein a Londonstreet as marauding, hoodie-wearing youngsters lookon.
If the analogy with Greece is a step too far just look at the street anarchy seen in London as the coalition has enforced rapid cuts in state expenditure.
But Mother Nature protects her treasures well, hiding them in hard-to-reach places, he says, and the people that look after them have little incentive to surrender control to London, Wall Street or anywhere else for that matter.