The UK Government has begun to build its team to drive the adoption of AI in government services.
Deputy Prime Minister Oliver Dowden announced the measure in a speech at a government training conference on programming, AI and data science, saying it reflects the opportunities to use the technology in increasing productivity in the public sector.
He also highlighted a trial of ‘AI red boxes’ to reduce paperwork in ministers' offices.
Dowden was speaking as the Cabinet Office published job ads for an initial 30 roles to build up the Incubator for AI team – which has been created to lead the work on upgrading the public sector’s AI capability – on the new ai.gov.uk website.
The roles include AI experts, programme managers, product managers and engagement specialists.
Assessing updates
“One of their first tasks will be to assess which government systems have data curated in the right way to take advantage of AI and which systems need updating before that full potential can be harnessed,” Dowden said.
“I think of the potential of this work, from correspondence to call handling, from health care to welfare.
“I don’t mean replacing real people with robots, or adding to the frustrations of dealing with government. I mean removing the things that annoy people most in their dealings with officialdom – namely the time it takes to do things quickly.”
He also pointed to the trial of AI red boxes – official documents prepared by ministers’ offices – which he first revealed in an interview with The Times in November. This involves using the technology instead of civil servants to read, summarise and compile documents for ministers.
“So much of the work that goes into producing the (red box) submissions I need to make decisions on as a minister involve taking a mass of different pieces of information, getting to the essence of the core point, then fitting that across with where parliament is, where the courts are, where public sentiment is,” he said at the time.
“If you could assimilate all that, that creates enormous both savings of time but also much more rigorous decision making.”
He added in his speech: “The potential productivity benefits from applying these technologies to routine tasks across the public sector are estimated to be worth billions.”
