Comparing the state with individuals

Douglas Carswell has an excellent post here contrasting two different ways of giving people power.

The Coalition is currently in the process of trying to implement my idea of a Great Repeal or Freedom Bill. Launched by officials as Your Freedom (but with a tone that implies their terms), it's moderated by people in Whitehall. Unsurprisingly, it has, at times, been overrun by angry trolls, and it is hard to see how it differs from every other on-line government consultation.

Meanwhile, the completely unmoderated and totally open Great Repeal Bill site, goes from strength to strength.

And as a micro example of how people can self-regulate perfectly reasonably, and discuss something significant and important without succumbing to "criminal elements", it's pretty good.

It also contrasts the government's superficially glossy but ultimately useless delivery of a service with the slightly less snazzy but infinitely more useful and usable solution created by individuals.

I'm also willing to be a fiver that the government solution cost thousands of pounds while the privately created solution simply piggy-backed off something that was already there -- something that the government could quite easily have done, but chose not to.

You might claim that this is a triviality and that it's not that important in the grand scheme of things.

I would turn that on its head and say if the government couldn't get this absolutely trivial thing done properly and cost-effectively, how on earth can you justify them trying to deliver even more complex, important and inherently expensive things properly?