Artificial Intelligence: National Security Implications

Debate between Baroness Lloyd of Effra and Lord Tarassenko

Tuesday 16th June 2026 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Lloyd of Effra (Lab)]

My noble friend highlights the importance of us being incredibly vigilant on cyber security. He highlights the important role that the cyber security Bill will play in bringing data centres, large load controllers and managed service providers into the regulatory ambit, as it were, but he is also right that we need to do more. The National Cyber Security Centre supports organisations through Cyber Essentials. It published new joint guidance with the AISI on preparing cyber defences for frontier AI. My noble friend also mentioned the importance of the Government taking cyber security seriously, which is what they have set out to do through the Government’s cyber action plan.

[Lord Tarassenko (CB)]

My Lords, I declare a conflict of interest as a senior adviser to the Alan Turing Institute, the national AI institute. We have known for a while that access to US big tech models might be restricted, and it will happen again. We should not rely on Chinese open source models either, for obvious reasons. There is an alternative: a UK sovereign AI model. The Alan Turing Institute has argued for several months that the UK has the technological capability in the institute, in academia and in its nascent AI industry. The UK also has sovereign data assets, such as data from the BBC and the Met Office. The Alan Turing Institute, as a national AI institute, could lead a team to train a sovereign model for millions of pounds, not billions of dollars, following UK values, including transparency and respect for copyright. The Council for Science and Technology’s AI subgroup and many others are convinced. What more evidence does DSIT need to fund the training of a UK sovereign AI model?

[Baroness Lloyd of Effra (Lab)]

We are very attentive to the importance of building out sovereign AI capabilities that complement the strength of the UK’s AI sector. At the model level, the sovereign AI fund has invested in Ineffable Intelligence and Cosine, and we are targeting companies innovating in hardware, providing an investment into Callison. In terms of the importance of investing in this area, that is an approach that we are able to take through the sovereign AI fund. In respect of the specific proposal that the noble Lord recommends, I am happy to pick that up with the department and come back to him specifically on that model.

Artificial Intelligence Legislation

Debate between Baroness Lloyd of Effra and Lord Tarassenko

Monday 17th November 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Lloyd of Effra (Lab)]

I thank my noble friend for her interest in this area. I can highlight that the AI Security Institute was established to provide the Government with exactly this kind of evidence and respond effectively to emerging AI risks. It has tested more than 30 frontier models, including OpenAI, Google DeepMind, Anthropic and others, and works closely with security experts across government, including the National Cyber Security Centre and Defence Science and Technology Laboratory. This is to ensure the institute’s work informs the preparations against AI-related incidents. We are committed to ensuring the UK is prepared for the changes AI will bring, and the institute’s research will continue to inform our approach.

[Lord Tarassenko (CB)]

My Lords, several European countries, including Italy, the Netherlands and Switzerland, have recently launched their own sovereign large language models to reduce dependence on models from the US and China. Now that hardware compute capabilities are no longer an issue in this country, is it not time for the UK to start developing its own sovereign large language model?

[Baroness Lloyd of Effra (Lab)]

The noble Lord asks a very good question about our sovereign capabilities. The Sovereign AI Unit’s remit spans the full AI stack, including large language models. Our priority is to secure UK access to the best models, including by deepening strategic partnerships and remaining open to backing UK companies to compete. However, we are focusing our efforts where there is greater opportunity for the UK to advance its strategic position in AI, looking across the value chain. This could mean supporting companies developing narrow models in high-impact sectors in which the UK has strengths, such as defence or drug discovery, or backing paradigm-shifting approaches in computing that can outperform incumbents.