Britain's Conservatives have just published a very smart little book called Towards a Lifetime of Saving. The idea is to give people a personal lifetime account, with a bit of government money thrown in to encourage people to add to it when they can. You can use it to save up for your retirement (and you keep everything you save - no means-testing it away like today's pension savings. But you can also dip into it through your lifetime, for things like illness, buying a house, or paying college fees.

It's a good idea. Well, I would say that, because it's remarkably similar to an idea that the Adam Smith Institute developed nine years ago, called the Fortune Account.

Indeed, it's been a good two weeks for ASI policies. Both Labour and Conservatives have adopted the choice agenda for health and education that we worked up 22 years ago. The government has endorsed another proposal we have been pushing for decades, using road user charges to replace fuel duty and car tax. The CBI revived our idea of upping the state pension (and the pension age) to overcome today's perverse incentives against saving.

Now, if only we could get politicians to adopt our proposals for slashing tax and regulation, we'd be in good shape!