The U.K. government has announced a national AI strategy — its first dedicated package aimed toward boosting the country’s capabilities in and around machine learning technologies over the long run It says it hopes the strategy will cause a rise within the number and kinds of AIs being developed and commercialized within the U.K. over subsequent 10 years.
The decide to prioritize and “level up” development and applications of AI follows earlier industrial and digital strategies — which talked up the promise of AI. But Boris Johnson’s government is now inching onward, announcing a 10-year decide to invest in making Britain “a global AI superpower”, because the government’s PR puts it — by targeting support at areas like upskilling and reskilling within the hopes of reaping AI-driven economic rewards down the road Whether there’s much of policy substance here, as yet, looks debatable.
Notably there’s a scarcity of latest money being announced to copy the strategy. For now the govt highlights what proportion cash investors are ploughing into U.K. AI companies (£13.5 billion into 1,400+ U.K. tech firms between January and June this year) — and flags a complete government investment into AI of £2.3 billion+ since 2014.
But there’s no word on what proportion funding the govt might put into supporting the event of AI from here on in — like through planned continued support for “postgraduate learning, retraining and ensuring children from wide backgrounds can access specialist courses”.
Instead the announcement is heavy on soundbites about “transform[ing] the UK’s capabilities in AI” — or positioning the U.K. as “the best place to measure and work with AI”, whatever meaning . (Presumably it’s a companion piece to the opposite government digital policy point — about making the U.K. the “safest place to travel online”, because it works on online safety legislation).
The early phase of the strategy looks focused on data-gathering to tell future AI policies. And, there, perhaps the foremost interesting element is an AI-focused review of the U.K.’s current copyright and patent rules.
There is also some geopolitical standards setting ambition on show — with the govt talking about putting AI provisions into trade deals — but whether the U.K. are going to be ready to punch so hard on the worldwide stage during this area remains to be seenIt’s also notable that while the government’s strategy talks about eager to establish “clear rules, applied ethical principles and a pro-innovation regulatory environment” for AI, the U.K. is already lagging on defining a regulatory framework — as it’s now outside the ecu Union which already features a comprehensive proposal for regulating high-risk applications of AI on the table.
Instead of clarity vis-à-vis data use, current U.K. government policy is simultaneously querying the present data protection regime — with ministers entertaining the thought of watering down rules within the hopes that weaker protections for citizen’s information will (somehow) boost people’s trust in and uptake of technologies like AI For AI startups and scale-ups specifically, the national strategy includes an idea to guage “private funding needs and challenges” — over subsequent six to 12 months.
While, over an equivalent time-frame , the govt says it’ll roll out a replacement visa regime — “to attract the world’s best AI talent to the UK”. (Of course the devil are going to be within the detail of what it announces there. But if U.K. startups were hoping the announcement of a national strategy to spice up AI might mean gaining imminent access to all or any kinds of interesting government data sets to coach AI models, the document only says that ministers will “consider what open and machine-readable government datasets are often published for AI models” — and can only turn their attention thereto particular task over subsequent 12 months or later. So that’s a wait and see, then.
“This National AI Strategy will signal to the planet our intention to create the foremost pro-innovation regulatory environment within the world; to drive prosperity across the united kingdom and ensure everyone can enjoy AI; and to use AI to assist solve global challenges like global climate change ,” said (new in post) digital secretary, Nadine Dorries, during a statement accompanying publication of the strategy If Dorries’ name is unfamiliar that’s because she recently replaced Oliver Dowden within the hot seat at the Department for Digital, Media, Culture and Sport (DCMS) — after yet one more ministerial reshuffle.
“AI are going to be central to how we drive growth and enrich lives, and therefore the vision began in our strategy will help us achieve both of these vital goals,” Dorries addedDowden only lasted just over a year within the post at DCMS, presiding over the U.K.’s digital policy (and all the remainder of the wide-ranging brief). That was still longer than his predecessor, Nicky Morgan — who was only there for a touch over half a year.
Before that the digital brief was the responsibility of (now former minister) Matt Hancock — so there has been quite the parade of politicians pulling U.K. tech policy strings in recent years So perhaps, as a primary tread on its claimed “long term” commitment to nurturing the country’s deep tech powers, the govt might consider an enduring ministerial appointment atop digital policy — to signal both a sustained specialise in levelling up the country’s technical capabilities in areas like AI and, at the ministerial level, an appropriate ability to understand basic best tech practices.
