Artificial Intelligence: News Media

Lord Bishop of Oxford Excerpts

Monday 7th July 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Twycross (Lab)]

The BBC did a recent study on the use of AI and has done a quite a lot of work on, for example, the accuracy of chatbots. It is very well placed to get that real sense of how appropriate it is to use it. We want people to use best practice, and we are clear that AI offers the most powerful lever we have for national renewal, but we need to get the balance right, as I and other ministerial colleagues have said before.

[The Lord Bishop of Oxford]

My Lords, the Minister will be aware of the risks in AI of the impersonation of human reporting. A number of jurisdictions are experimenting with and exploring the watermarking of AI content, so that it is clear what is produced artificially and what is produced by people. The former Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg says in an article in the Times today that he is very sceptical of that approach. There is a counter-comment from Professor Michael Wooldridge of Oxford University commending it. Do the Government have a view on watermarking, and are their plans to introduce such legislation in the forthcoming AI Bill?

[Baroness Twycross (Lab)]

Without having read the article or looked into it in detail, I am hesitant to give a response, other than to say that we need to make sure that we get AI use up to an accurate level. Ultimately, in terms of news reporting, we are also very clear that the original source—the newspapers—need the revenue they get from people going through their pages for advertising, for example. I am happy to write to the right reverend Prelate on that point.