Flickr user Stuck in Customs

In case you missed it, in response to ongoing kerfuffles with Beaufort's horse carriage tours, the city has proposed instituting a forced monopoly.

The general idea being that if there's just one operator and there's too much poo on our historic streets, we'll know whose belly button to push to get it cleaned. 

(Backstory on the idea over here.)

Well, as you'd expect, there are many problems that come to mind when contemplating the fix: Everything from "is it too much government meddling?" to "can the city legally do this?"

Riffing on that note, The Island Packet has published a decent column about the many reasons why it's a bad idea to force a monopoly, and the paper spends a few sentences pitching better solutions.

Take a read here.

• Keep up with local horse carriage news on out topic page.