Online identity assurance programme: Scottish Government ‘show & tell’ (28 March 2018) #identityassurance @digitalscots

Posted on by
Reply

This post is my digital record of the Scottish Government’s Online Identity Assurance (OLA) ‘show and tell’. The day was very informative, and provided me the opportunity to catch up with friends in civil society circles. I’m especially interested because online identity is a natural precursor to online voting, another problematic area that greatly interests me.

The post starts with a recap of what was said at the event, then notes my input at the event. Next are my reactions to the event itself, followed by my thoughts on the whole OLA programme. In summary, while I think OLA is very worthwhile, and that the Scottish Government is trying to do it the right way, I have a lot of reservations about how useful it will be for those who most need government support. Continue reading →

A not-so-brief history of Personal Independence Payments

Posted on by
Reply

Here is a saga of my sister’s application for Personal Independence Payments. She applied for this state benefit in June 2017, yet 10 months later there is no sign of her receiving it.

My sister’s network includes my ever-wonderful wife. Her help has included direct support of my sister, and of our mother who has very severe issues of her own. My brother and his wife are also very supportive of our sister and mother, especially providing on-the-spot support, while I concentrate on the bureaucracy. They all live fairly close, but my wife and I live over 300 miles from them.

While I feel more about my sister’s case than about any other, she has possibly one of the most fortunate cases. I am deeply concerned for others who do not have such a strong support network.

The major issues we’ve faced are, in rough chronological order: Continue reading →

My wallet is bulging – with paper receipts

Posted on by
Reply

I prefer to pay for nearly everything using my debit card. (The exceptions are the snack vending machines at work, because they talk back to lusers with an annoying Sirius Cybernetics voice. I prefer to receive receipts, and keep them to check that the entries on my bank statements are believable. However, this means my wallet tends to bulge with valueless pieces of paper.

It struck me tonight that this is a huge waste of resources too: paper, printing ink, electricity, whatever the printer is made of, people’s time putting rolls of till receipt into machines (been there, done that, bought the t-shirt with the image of trapped fingers) and so on. And there is no need for any of this! Continue reading →

What has Bruce been up to (late March to early April 2018)

Posted on by
Reply

Last week

Continue reading →

Petition

Posted on by
Reply

If you are against Brexit, or are in favour of it but wish it to be on a sound legal footing, you may be interested in this petition. Its text is

Declare the 2016 referendum vote null and void due to foreign interference

It is clear now that foreign influence and inaccurate facts were highly influential on the electorate during the Brexit referendum and therefore the result should be declared as null and void.

Continue reading →

What has Bruce been up to? (again)

Posted on by
Reply

Following on from this post – I’ll try to blog each week:

  • Tuesday 13th: being interviewed about my experiences of Edinburgh, and how tourists and residents see different aspects of the city
  • Tuesday 13th to Thursday 15th: on this course, which was ‘enhanced’ by two fire-alarms and freezing our collective bits off in the snow
  • Thursday 15th: completing two funding applications, one of which succeeded. (The other will be decided in about 3 month’s time.)

Continue reading →