The British Government’s AI Action Plan

Uploaded on 2025-01-13 in TECHNOLOGY-Key Areas-Artificial Intelligence, NEWS-Cybersecurity News, GOVERNMENT-National, FREE TO VIEW

The British government has revealed it’s plans to invest in, and make active use of , Artificial Intelligence (AI), with investment in the infrastructure that powers the technology as a key focus.

Prime Minister Keir Starmer is launching the "AI Opportunities Action Plan", an initiative designed to position the UK as a global AI leader as currently the UK has a growing number of economic and infrastructure problems.

The plan includes the government setting up its own public sector AI computer capacity as well as working with the private sector to maximise its benefits and encourage innovation, while ensuring safety.

Starmer says that the plan is not just about supporting the tech elite. “Our plan will make Britain the world leader. “That means more jobs and investment in the UK, more money in people’s pockets, and transformed public services,”. The UK Science Secretary Peter Kyle has said online safety cannot be “pitted against economic investment”. Kyle is adamant that attracting tech investment would not come at the cost of weakening safety standards.

The launch of the AI action plan comes as major American technology companies appear to be aligning themselves with incoming US President Trump to resist regulation.

Meta chief executive Mark Zuckerberg announced his company would be eliminating its content moderation activities in the US while X owner Elon Musk has repeatedly prioritised “free speech absolutism” since taking over the platform formerly known as Twitter.

In contrast to development is the US, Britain, the EU and Australia all have strict new measures on youth protection and controlling online harms which apply to the major social media platforms and the various US giant technology companies which operate them.

Against this background, Kyle thinks that the UK could become an AI “sweet spot”, attracting the sort of investment and innovation that could cut government costs and boost economic growth.

The bid for economic growth has become more urgent following recent setbacks to the new Labour goverment. If balancing the concerns over online free speech, AI’s impact on the climate crisis and the threat it poses to wiping out humanity are not enough, the economic headwinds Britain is now experiencing makes the launch of the government’s AI action plan even more important.

In comment, Tom Whittaker, director at UK law firm Burges Salmon, says “In fact, Government is doing more for the AI sector than what's set out in the AI Opportunities Action Plan. For example, the plan does not refer to the government's push for public sector organisations to publish on a register where they are developing or using AI... We can see from research and public registers of AI development and use that there is a great deal of enthusiasm across the public sector to use AI to improve public services.”

The action plan addresses infrastructure concerns, including how the UK will build the data centres and electricity grid necessary for AI innovation. It will also have to deal with the technology’s large demand for water. Data centres require electricity to power them and water to keep them cool, which could become a problem if they have to compete with consumers in peak demand periods.

Other measures in the plan include setting up a new National Data Library to “unlock” public data to support AI development and making AI adoption a priority for government departments.

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