Gordon Brown outsourced the momentous task of restraining the nanny State yesterday - to a quango of seven people. That should constitute its own health warning.

Politicians speak increasingly as though they are unable to control the excesses of the State - the killjoys who take aim at hanging baskets, conkers and geography field trips, now deemed fatal to the nation. But these killjoys are all on the State's payroll.

The new anti-nanny quango, the Risk and Regulation Advisory Council (RRAC), aims to challenge the kind of zealots who insist that “water may be hot”. This laudable initiative will please the parents who were banned from borrowing armbands for their toddlers at Bournemouth swimming pools (“may contain germs”), and the oppressed cheese-rollers of Gloucestershire, whose sport was cancelled last year because St John Ambulance was only insured to rescue people from the bottom of the hill, not the slope. Yes, it's high time government stood up for nanny's victims. But against whom? If 10 Downing Street cannot restrain the excesses of Leviathan, what hope has a group of seven?

The Prime Minister should beware: this project may contain pitfalls. One of the RRAC's first tasks will be to evaluate the frenzy of government initiatives to tackle the MRSA superbug. How should this work? Will Gordon Brown urge Alan Johnson on Mondays to make more announcements about deep cleans, but on Fridays call him to urge restraint? Will the outcome not simply be the creation of yet another quango, one to adjudicate in the matter of Brown v Brown?

If Mr Brown wants to kill off the killjoys, he could slash the burgeoning budget of the Health and Safety Executive. He could change a host of regulations. He could express regret that Paul Waugh, the coastguard who rescued a teenage girl from a cliff, resigned last week after being censured for not wearing a safety harness. “The cliff edge was crumbling away and I didn't think I had time [to get the kit],” he said. His employer did not even mention the saving of the girl's life. “We are proud of our safety record,” the Marine and Coastguard Agency said. “We seek to maintain the safety of our volunteers, and minimise risk.” So where in their job description is saving lives?

It is a symptom of the overweight State that administrators at the top come to rate intellectual debates about risk management higher than the gut instincts of the brave people at the bottom. If Mr Brown is genuinely concerned about this, he cannot delegate. He would have to stop parroting “more State” as the answer to every problem. He would have to stop his ministers treating people with contempt. For it is their own attitudes that filter down through all the layers of Leviathan.

An outbreak of bullying has infected some government departments since ministers have been spooked by a host of calamities, from the lost discs to the illegal immigrants employed as security guards. In October health ministers were horrified by the discovery that hundreds of patients had died at Maidstone Hospital from bugs acquired there. Conciliatory management disappeared in favour of threats. The tone of meetings, I am told, changes as soon as Mr Johnson enters the room. To some extent this is understandable. “We get the blame if things go wrong,” one political adviser told me recently, “so we might as well take control.” But even foundation trusts were ordered before Christmas to employ matrons, by ministers who didn't seem to realise that trusts are legally free to make up their own minds. Most trusts are well run and believe that matrons are another tier of management and a waste of money. Ministers who do not listen will find that when staff fear to speak the truth, further blunders become inevitable.

In the end bullying enfeebles even the bullies. Lobby journalists have become used to receiving text messages, constructed almost entirely of expletives, from Damien McBride, Downing Street's press man. Maybe hacks sometimes deserve a hard time. But it is counter-productive for the political class to be so graceless under pressure. At the Department for International Development, where Douglas Alexander and Shriti Vadera are jostling for power, one senior official presented a lengthy policy paper recently. The response was a one-line text message that was, decidedly, uncomplimentary. The arrogance is shocking.

It is hard to escape the impression that the Government is becoming detached from reality. The Northern Rock asteroid is about to blow a £25billion hole in the government finances here on Earth, yet ministers plough on with costly initiatives that look like science fiction: personal trainers, health screening, children's hubs. Outside, house repossessions are on the rise. Inside, Whitehall is littered with bright young men talking about how the State can encourage innovation.

If you believe that government can solve every problem, you end up with agencies that think they know best, and which you can't control. You end up with ministers claiming that they were too busy and important to pay attention to trifling matters, such as declaring £100,000. You end up with an operational framework for the NHS that looks like a circuit-board on acid. You end up despising the public as much as they despise you.

The idea that Mr Brown will stop the stoppers is a fudge, which holds nothing but contempt for our intelligence. Here is the health warning that the new quango should deliver to its new boss: treating us all like idiots could damage your political health.

Times Recommends

• Nerdy cafés no longer maid in heaven
• Cameron will not break marriage vow
• Avatar will make the case on climate