Aunt's affairs, LPA and my NI

When I took out Legal Power of Attorney for my aged aunt, the process required my witnessed signature along with the witnessed signature of at least two other people, which is important because it's a legal document.

Taking over my aunt’s affairs has elicited a bit of bureaucracy from some banks, and councils. However, the Pension Service is bureaucratic par excellence, because before accepting the registered power of attorney the Pension Service insisted it required my National Insurance number.

I can’t understand why the Service needs my NI number, when it's got the witnessed LPA and because there’s nothing to stop the LPA being held by someone who doesn’t work or live in England, or it could be held by a professional, such as a lawyer working for a large organisation.

Sadly, the Pension Service has already proved its intrusion into my affairs by now writing to me, not under the name in which I registered the LPA and that I use for almost all my affairs, and the name I used when I wrote to the service but under my married name. This proves the Pension Service has accessed information about me when it should be concerned only with information about my aunt.

Joined up government might be a worthy aspiration but this is inappropriate, intrusive joined up government that implies spying and surveillance of its citizens.

New baby

Middle step daughter had a baby girl yesterday morning around five o'clock. All well. She writes in Facebook:

"Team Flood are home. And going to bed."

I like this 'team' business - start as you mean to go on.

Thought for the day

In two and a half minutes some people can argue convincingly and fluently.

Today's Today Programme Thought for the day on Radio 4 was Anne Atkins. She argues theology controversially. She starts from the recently discovered Shakespeare play, discusses how the script has moved on from what it was to modern literature criticism. Lit crit can't improve with time, so she asks:

Who's going to know more about a playwright, scholarly editors 400 years later or contemporary actors who shared a play with him?

Theology can suffer a similar lag of logic on the lines of 'They believed that sort of thing in those days' and Atkins reminds of gospel stories, as if a fisherman couldn't tell without the second law of thermodynamics that you can't walk on water or that Lazarus sister didn't know you can't raise a man that's been four days dead and lies in his tomb. Yet she and her community saw Lazarus walk out alive.

Members of the jury do you want in your witness box an eminent man of letters with a sophisticated intellectual theory of how the crime could have been committed
or the eye witness who saw it happen?

Stones of the sky

I see Robin Richmond has an exhibition in London this month, at the Curwen Gallery. The web site here shows some interesting and soulful paintings, of skies. I like them. I wouldn't mind having one, though I don't know which nor where I'd hang it. I just know that these paintings appeal to me.

Robin's speaking on Thursday 18th. It might be fun to listen and Robin is a relative so would be chance to meet up again for a few moments.

Robin has her own web site with video, reviews and collections here.