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Tom Loosemore

@tomski.com

Partner at Public Digital, co-founder Government Digital Service, ex-BBC. Expect occasional small boat sailing.

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Latest posts by Tom Loosemore @tomski.com

I genuinely don't know how to get them... I'm always there in the dot, and click quick!! The only year i managed was 2020, when it got cancelled! Maybe I'll write me a bot...

09.03.2026 20:13 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 1 πŸ“Œ 0

I didn't... sniff... it sold out in about 4 seconds

09.03.2026 20:07 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 1 πŸ“Œ 0

This stuff is still a way away from being production-ready for anything serious. But it has got a lot better in the last 6 months.

09.03.2026 11:36 πŸ‘ 3 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0

You still have to treat it like an over-excitable puppy, but telling it up front what standards you expect it to follow is a no-regrets move. I now add "check carefully for restrictions on any data that you use, and share these with me before using any data you find." This sometimes works...

09.03.2026 11:34 πŸ‘ 2 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 1 πŸ“Œ 0

Very similar experience with using Replit the first time. I've learned that you're best off starting by designing the tests you want it to pass (Test Driven Development, not unit testing), then ask for a well designed API that follows GDS API standards, and only then ask for the front end...

09.03.2026 11:12 πŸ‘ 2 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 1 πŸ“Œ 0

I'm no expert, but my reckon is that it's the delta btwn on-device capability and cloud, hence them having to do a slightly desperate deal with Google for access to Gemini. Plus they didn't think through agentic security, which was a really weird error (see Siri demo snafu from last year)

06.03.2026 10:39 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 1 πŸ“Œ 0

Totally. It's also potentially incredibly useful. And 15 years ago we'd have run around screaming about the privacy implications of today's Cloud + Smartphone + Sensors. The moats only gonna get deeper I fear.

06.03.2026 09:42 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 1 πŸ“Œ 0

Yeah which is why using bank statements as proof of address is such a nightmare. Until last year I was hoping Apple might ride to the rescue wrt on device inference...

06.03.2026 09:39 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 1 πŸ“Œ 0

Agreed - though if you're mad you can give OpenClaw access to email, calendar and I'll wager Opus would do a surprisingly good job of joining the dots of irregular payments. (I'm not mad)

06.03.2026 09:35 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 1 πŸ“Œ 0

Agree completely - hence the need for two "agents" where the one that accesses your financial info is acting entirely in your interests - and as @robbowley.net pointed out, this agent probably doesn't need much if any AI since open banking data is already well structured.

05.03.2026 13:12 πŸ‘ 3 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0

I agree almost completely. Normalisation of transactional identifiers across different banks is still... messy, but will doubtless improve. And there are some kinds of income/outgoings that could benefit from some natural language magic (irregular child maintenance payments etc)

05.03.2026 13:10 πŸ‘ 1 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 1 πŸ“Œ 0
Preview
Letting the Agents run wild – seamless Public Services? A few days ago I shared a video of an AI Agent hosting a benefit entitlement interview. The AI Agent intuits a lot in the course of this conversation, but still has to ask loads of tricky financial…

I blogged about using AI Agents to infer benefit entitlement directly from bank statements. Which is kinda wild... (also, Open Banking is a huge national asset).

loosemore.com/2026/03/05/4...

05.03.2026 11:50 πŸ‘ 11 πŸ” 1 πŸ’¬ 3 πŸ“Œ 0

Cabinet Ministers have a formal legal status. But not their departments.

05.03.2026 00:08 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 1 πŸ“Œ 0

They're agents of the Crown. Hence why they can be created, discarded or merged at will. And why you can negotiate (or renegotiate) on their behalf without their consent. Most of the Β£4bn of tech savings btwn 2011-2015 came courtesy of the latter.

04.03.2026 23:18 πŸ‘ 2 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 1 πŸ“Œ 0
Preview
Local LLMs for OpenClaw: the models, the RAM, the trade-offs Most local LLMs can't handle OpenClaw's tool calling. 8 models across 5 RAM tiers, here's what works.

Has anyone got OpenClaw working well with a local LLM? This article is giving me the fear, but I'm sure most of my stuff doesn't need cloud LLM oomph rentamac.io/best-local-l...

04.03.2026 09:32 πŸ‘ 1 πŸ” 1 πŸ’¬ 1 πŸ“Œ 0

What are you run on?

02.03.2026 14:27 πŸ‘ 1 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 1 πŸ“Œ 0

That's a fair challenge. I wonder how OpenClaw would get on running one of the open LLM models (not quite well enough I'll wager - at least not quite *yet*).

02.03.2026 14:05 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 1 πŸ“Œ 0
Preview
πŸ‡«πŸ‡· data.gouv.fr connecte les chatbots IA aux donnΓ©es publiques franΓ§aises via MCP Un serveur MCP open source pour interroger les donnΓ©es officielles franΓ§aises directement depuis Claude, ChatGPT ou Gemini. Instance publique disponible, sans clΓ© API.

I fear the French are overtaking us... goodtech.info/datagouv-ser...

02.03.2026 11:50 πŸ‘ 7 πŸ” 2 πŸ’¬ 1 πŸ“Œ 1

As others with much more experience than me have pointed out, it's surprisingly rare that a lack of understanding of someone's legal entitlement to be the primary barrier. people getting benefits. It's... complex.

02.03.2026 11:34 πŸ‘ 1 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 1 πŸ“Œ 0

I did check that, and until she's got attendance allowance his mother can't be included.

02.03.2026 11:28 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 1 πŸ“Œ 0
Preview
OpenClaw MCP-enabled benefits entitlement interview Here’s a video of a benefit entitlement conversation hosted by an AI Agent (OpenClaw Opus4.5) using my new MissingBenefit.com MCP server to do the calculations. The circumstances are fake. Th…

Over the weekend I played with using OpenClaw (Opus 4.5) and my new MissingBenefit.com MCP server to conduct mock benefit entitlement sessions.

The results were... well, have a look at the video my blog post.

loosemore.com/2026/03/02/o...

02.03.2026 10:48 πŸ‘ 6 πŸ” 3 πŸ’¬ 4 πŸ“Œ 2
On pressing the space bar for the Cabinet
On pressing the space bar for the Cabinet YouTube video by Russell Davies

My friend Russell on persuading the powers that be that ministers, apparently for the first time ever, watch a ppt-style presentation in the actual Cabinet Room - leading to some excellent advice about visiting a venue before you present.

02.03.2026 06:56 πŸ‘ 25 πŸ” 6 πŸ’¬ 3 πŸ“Œ 4

I've been buying them in bulk second hand, cus I is cheap... (and people sell off job lots)

28.02.2026 19:47 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 1 πŸ“Œ 0

it's very very addictive...

28.02.2026 19:07 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 1 πŸ“Œ 0

Independent Financial Advisor

27.02.2026 21:01 πŸ‘ 1 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
Preview
HMRC collects extra Β£16bn from big business with more β€˜hands-on’ approach Extra tax obtained from the 2,000 largest businesses doubles in three years

You don’t hear much about efficient and effective govt so here’s a good news story in our latest @nao.org.uk report - HMRC collected an extra Β£16bn from the biggest businesses last year after it took a β€œmore hands-on approach”
www.ft.com/content/c96d... (Full report: www.nao.org.uk/reports/taxi...)

27.02.2026 20:01 πŸ‘ 47 πŸ” 16 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 3

Thank you...

27.02.2026 17:28 πŸ‘ 1 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0

What's the best OpenBanking API provider for normal UK customers? Just need statement read access, nothing complicated, but ideally statement entries normalised across banks @dgen.net

27.02.2026 17:08 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 1 πŸ“Œ 0

Most IFAs are toast.

27.02.2026 16:10 πŸ‘ 1 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 1 πŸ“Œ 0
Preview
What is the best CAPTCHA solver in 2026 Discover the best CAPTCHA solver in 2026 with CapSolver, the ultimate tool for automated web scraping, CAPTCHA bypass, and data collection using advanced AI and machine learning. Enjoy bonus codes, se...

www.capsolver.com/blog/All/bes...

27.02.2026 11:58 πŸ‘ 2 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0