Ministry for Information Technology
A new Ministry for Information Technology would be an excellent idea. We could actually make RFCs law, and oblige ISPs to disconnect users whose machines are so badly configured as to compromise the security of the network.
However, the best thing a hypothetical new Ministry for Information Technology could do would be to mandate that *all* software is to be made available in Source Code form, whether or not it is intended to be distributed by users.
Concealing the Source Code has done *nothing* to prevent widespread unauthorised copying of Windows and Office. It has, however:
* Wasted countless person-hours as people, denied the ability to adapt the software to suit the way they do business, have been forced to adapt the way they do business to match what the software expects.
* Created a situation where drivers for devices soldered to the SAME motherboard can conflict with one another, because the drivers are being written by people who do not get to see each other's code and hence are not able to check for hidden pitfalls they might be creating for each other; and where accidentally-stumbled-upon hidden APIs can be used for mischief.
* It has also created a situation where hardware manufacturers can decree obsolescence by stopping providing drivers for new Operating Systems (if the Source Code were available, drivers could easily be written), and make inaccurate claims which cannot be disproved because the Source Code is hidden (e.g. the use of a 2Mpx sensor in a so-called "6 megapixel" digital camera, whose firmware then creates JPEG images containing the claimed number of pixels; the source code for converting the RAW image format would reveal this duplicity, hence it is kept hidden from users).
* It has tied customers to vendors by creating artificial barriers; the reason why there is no credible competition for MS Office is the closed save-file format, which is hard to decipher without information which Microsoft deliberately withhold and which Microsoft change with every release to thwart competitors (and to persuade users of older Office versions to update to the latest version, for no better reason than because they can no longer load files saved by their contacts using the latest version; old versions of Microsoft software pose a greater threat to Microsoft than Open Source).
If Microsoft, Adobe and all the rest of the Closed Source vendors don't like it, then let them go and jump. Users outnumber vendors; and our right to inspect and modify the Source Code of programs we run on OUR computers must trump their right to keep secrets and tell lies. Perhaps a few years ago, consumer power alone would have been enough to create a regime which was favourable to users at the expense, if necessary, of rich corporations; but today, ONLY a government can do this.
Even if the players decided to "take their ball home" and stopped selling their wares in the UK, the resulting setback to the UK's IT industry would be only a temporary one; and, following the recovery, we would be in a far better position than countries where the bully-boy tactics of the big closed-source vendors were still being tolerated.