Our Glorious Bureaucracy

I realise that there have to be rules and paperwork but this:

Ali Abbas, the Iraqi orphan who lost both arms in the war, has been told he will not receive backdated disability payments in Britain because he cannot prove his injuries existed before last week.

Some readers might think that being the uncaring right wing bastard that I am that I would welcome this saving of the taxpayer’s money. Unfortunately not, I rather blemish my libertarian credentials by actually believing that a welfare state is necessary, for political if not for moral reasons at least. Some poor kid who’s had both his arms blown off is someone that we should be supporting, if we are to support anyone at all.

What is actually enraging is that whichever paper shuffler is demanding proof of his injuries merely has to look at today’s (and via the archives, April 2003’s) Telegraph for a photograph of Ali having treatment, sans the limbs in question.

Perhaps this is merely another demonstration of why we need ID cards, Ali could clutch one in his stumps as he begs for official favour?