Keir Starmer has acknowledged that there are risks with the government’s plans to seek productivity savings from the rollout of artificial intelligence across departments and the wider public sector.
But the prime minister told a meeting of parliament’s Liaison Committee, which brings together the chairs of select committees, that the opportunities posed by increased digitisation were crucial to seize.
Starmer’s comments yesterday follow a package of announcements in January alongside the publication of the State of Digital Government Review, which touted the prospect of £45bn in annual savings for the public sector from “full potential digitisation”.
The PM was asked directly about the risks of AI by Public Accounts Committee chair Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown. He told Starmer that the Department for Work and Pensions had dropped two AI tools because they had been deemed to be discriminatory against certain claimants and suggested that ethics needed to play a role in government’s use of AI.
“Absolutely,” Starmer replied. “There are huge opportunities and risks, and we need to marry the two.”
The prime minister said he believed it was important to be receptive to the use of new digital tools to improve the delivery of public services.
“In the end, I think your stance matters,” he said. “Are you forward-leaning, seeing the opportunity, or leaning back, seeing the risk and not wanting to move?
“I’m in the first camp, but I absolutely accept that’s got to be within a framework that means AI can be used for good purpose and safely. I believe it can. But we need to bear that in mind all the time.”
Clifton-Brown said that while replacing legacy systems would be part of the way government could become more efficient through the better use of technology, “changing the way the civil service works” would be the “biggest issue”.
He said a theme that had emerged at recent PAC sessions was embedding digital and cyber-information officers at senior management levels, and on senior boards, in every department of the civil service. Clifton-Brown asked Starmer if that was something he might consider.
“Yes,” the PM replied. “I think it’s really vital. We want to double the number of civil servants working in data and digital roles by 2030, so we increase the volume. There will be incentives for that. We’ve got 2,000 tech-track apprentices in place for that very reason.
“I think this can be transformative, not just for the services that are externally delivered, but to the heart of government in relation to some of the tasks that are being done.”
Starmer said he believed planning and probation services were two areas where staff could benefit from using AI to collate required information, allowing officials, as decision-makers, to spend more time on their professional judgment.
“I think it will be transformative of what we can do, how we can do it, and it releases individuals to be more human,” he said.
“I’m certainly pushing this forward from the centre. I think this sort of transformation only really happens if No.10 is absolutely full-square behind it. So I’m personally pushing this.”
He added: “I think this is going to be a game changer if we can get it right. We need to push it through.”
How will cutting regulation boost growth?
Elsewhere in yesterday’s session, Liaison Committee chair Dame Meg Hillier asked Starmer how much of a boost he expected economic growth to receive from plans to “strip away” the number of regulators in the UK.
“I think there’s a large chunk of growth we can get by stripping away regulation," Starmer replied. “You’ll be astonished by how many regulators and regulatory bodies we’ve put in place over the years.”
Hillier pointed out that she had spent a considerable amount of time looking at the work of regulatory bodies. She asked Starmer what examples he could give of where growth would occur from decreased regulation.
The PM said “speed of decision-making" was one area.
“As soon as you’ve got a regulator in place you can bet your bottom dollar that there’s got to be a consultation with X, Y and Z before a decision can be made,” he said. “That then takes forever; there’s a deadline that’s breached and nobody wants to do anything about it because you might come up against the regulator.
“And the priorities of the regulator aren’t necessarily aligned with what the government’s trying to achieve. So there’s a huge amount of work to do there.”
Starmer said planning was “a classic example” of an area where decisions took far too long.
Hillier asked Starmer if he would publish the minutes of the government’s mission boards to allow parliament and the wider public to scrutinise what’s being done in relation to driving economic growth and also on regulatory reform.
The prime minister said he needed to “go away and have a think about that” because he said the mission boards were a place that ideas were generated and he pushed teams hard.
Starmer pledged to consider ways that more transparency could be brought to the work of mission boards, without committing to publish minutes.