UK can be ‘AI sweet spot’: Starmer’s tech minister on regulation, Musk, and free speech
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Technology secretary Peter Kyle has the task of making Britain a leading player in the AI revolution, but says economic growth will not come at the cost of online safety. With the NHS still struggling, a prisons crisis still teetering and Britain’s borrowing costs soaring, there are few easy jobs going in Keir Starmer’s cabinet at present.
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But even in such difficult times, the task of convincing Silicon Valley’s finest to help make Britain a leader in the artificial intelligence (AI) revolution – all while one leading tech boss uses the Labour government as a regular punching bag and others ostentatiously move closer to Donald Trump – is among the most challenging.
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This is the mission that has fallen to Peter Kyle, the science and technology secretary, who has become an important figure in Starmer’s cabinet. 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 this week of the government’s AI action plan even more important. And Kyle is worried Britain could miss the boat.
Speaking to the Observer, he said: “We need a concerted effort as a country to ensure now, while we’re still in the foothills, that we are laying the foundations. I don’t want us to be a country that is always buying off the shelf from others. I want us to be at the cutting edge. We are the third-largest AI market in the world, but we’re not touching the sides of our potential.”.
