National infrastructure and public interest covers the policy areas currently covered by:

• DEFRA (the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
• DECC (the Department of Energy and Climate Change)
• DCMS (the Department for Culture, Media and Sport)
• DCLG (the Department for Communities and Local Government), and
• DfT (the Department for Transport)

These departments all deal with issues where government is assumed to have a role in issues that could otherwise be left to free choice, because of the need to apply considerations of the public interest that would not be taken account of properly by the market without government intervention.

This is a tricky area for a liberal. People may believe that all sorts of things that other people do ought to be controlled in the greater public interest (which usually turn out to be in accordance with their own prejudices). For instance, the French government managed to persuade itself that the production of yoghurt was a matter of significant public interest and security implications. Just because someone wants to stick their nose in someone else's business does not make it a legitimate matter for government intervention. On the other hand, there are clearly areas, which economists use terms like "externalities", "public goods" and "market failure" to describe, where the existing institutional framework of the market ignores (or undervalues) material impacts that should be taken into account.

Where the activities of the above Departments are straightforward meddling without substantive economic justification, we argue for their abolition and an associated reduction in the bureaucracy. Where their activities tackle issues of genuine, material impact in a number of areas, we offer replacements of the current, micro-managing, bureaucratic approach with a principles-based approach expanding the institutional framework to provide rational incentives towards socially-optimal solutions. Those areas are listed below.