bottom-up government

Today was a day of waiting. I left the house at 10:30am and got back at 5:30pm spending most of the day waiting. I was signing on, claiming housing benefit. The entire day was not wasted, however, since I met Dillon at the Job Centre Plus.

Dillon was very nice, and he helped me out with various transferal forms which I needed to complete from Edinburgh to London. I explained some aspects of The Wave, and he verified that the institution was slow in trying to deal with the expected number of unemployed. He suggested at first that I speak to others, but I made it clear that I was not going to put things into writing and if we managed to make an appointment with anyone higher up, I hoped he might take part. He was open to the idea and contributed his assistance. I returned later that day, but he was busy and I ended up having to wait for an hour.

There is a possibility that he might make contact with people he has worked with who are further up the decision ladder. It will be interesting. I will, of course, be trying to approach those further up myself independently.

Although I took pains to describe the situation even to the point that our mode of communication defeated our attempts, his talking about my idea or planting a seed in his head. I can only emphasise that it is a matter of looking at the external conditions and for each of us to respond to it. It really is as simple as that. Then we look around to see what we are doing, and if we are listening to one another, we will find that all the ideas, all the services, all our skills, are more than enough to deal with this situation. And indeed, to strengthen our social ties because of it. In times of war, we bond socially. We face a major problem: let us come together. Together we can ride this wave.

Remember, we only have a week or two to get this thing happening.

090120

Dillon hasn't been able to contact David, someone he has worked with in the past who occupies a position higher up the system. I invited him to come to the hive, and he might turn up tomorrow afternoon. Meanwhile, I am going to try to hit the Department of Work and Pensions.

Looking around their site, I find there is no phone number, and it is all bottled through a single email entry. There is an address, but I suspect this is just for mail, and it will not be the base for the department. It is like a moat. There is only one way in. How on earth do we go about trying to communicate to eg Rt Hnr James Purnell, or anyone in the executive committee (http://www.dwp.gov.uk/aboutus/executiveteam.asp)?

This is going to be trickier than I thought. I thought I could at least talk with someone on the phone. Oh dear.