Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:

To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, what assessment her Department has made of the safety of human-level machine learning systems; and what steps she is taking to support AI safety research.

To address the potential risks and opportunities presented by AI technology, the Office for AI is working at pace to develop a White Paper setting out our position on regulating AI.

Our starting point is that the best way to realise the full economic and societal potential of AI is through a context-based approach to regulation, leveraging the sector expertise of our world-class regulators and focusing on real risks arising from the use of AI rather than the technology itself. This approach will establish a framework based on a set of cross-cutting principles to inform how regulators should tackle risks.

As indicated by our policy statement in July 2022, we will ensure our approach to AI regulation is risk based, proportionate, and adaptable. Our approach will also look for ways to ensure effective horizon scanning, to monitor both immediate and long term AI risks. We will also make sure we deploy the full range of non-regulatory tools to support effective governance – including technical standards and assurance.

In October 2022, we launched the AI Standards Hub, led by the Alan Turing Institute, to amplify the UK’s voice in the development of global technical standards for responsible AI. The Centre for Data Ethics and Innovation have also set out their AI Assurance roadmap which aims to build an ecosystem for AI assurance.

Alongside this, the Government provides funding via UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) for academic research, and last year, the Arts and Humanities Research Council announced £8.5m funding for research towards safe and ethical AI.

Together, Government funding will ensure that the UK remains at the forefront of AI research globally – with research from the UK the third most cited globally, behind only the US and China.