Oral Answers to Questions

Greg Clark Excerpts

Thursday 23rd November 2023 Commons Chamber

[Alex Burghart]

I am sure the hon. Gentleman will have noted—I imagine he pays attention to such things—that we already set out in the spring statement last year the public sector fraud authority, which is based in the Cabinet Office and very ably handled by my colleague Baroness Neville-Rolfe. We have debated fraud during covid many times in the House. All the contracts handed out during covid were signed off by extremely able and capable civil servants who were working in very difficult circumstances and the idea that there was ministerial sign off of these things is wrong and must be contradicted whenever it is raised.

[Greg Clark (Tunbridge Wells) (Con)]

It is clear from the Chancellor’s autumn statement yesterday that we will need to make savings in public sector budgets for some years to come to overcome the impact of inflation, so can the Minister say how artificial intelligence will play a role in that in the public sector and what efforts he is making to procure the necessary systems?

[Alex Burghart]

My right hon. Friend makes an excellent point. We are still coming to terms with the potential of artificial intelligence to speed up Government processes, improve productivity and deliver value for money for the taxpayer. While we have procurement frameworks at present that help Departments across Government identify good AI systems they might wish to secure, we are also interested in developing our own AI within Government. My right hon. Friend the Deputy Prime Minister announced earlier this week that we would hire more people with the highest levels of innovative skill to come into Government to build those systems for us and deliver value for money.

--- Later in debate ---

[Oliver Dowden]

I refer the hon. Gentleman to a written ministerial statement I made to the House a couple of months ago, in which I explained how, at length, we have implemented many recommendations, for example from the Boardman review and others. That included strengthening the civil service contractual requirements in relation to the Advisory Committee on Business Appointments and introducing a deed of covenant for Ministers to uphold the findings of the Advisory Committee on Business Appointments. I continue to engage with Lord Pickles, who chairs ACOBA, about further such reforms that can be undertaken.

[Greg Clark (Tunbridge Wells) (Con)]

The Deputy Prime Minister played a prominent role at the artificial intelligence summit in Bletchley Park earlier this month. One big question is whether open source should be encouraged and perhaps even required, in order to encourage openness and innovation, or whether it should be restricted, to keep the models in the hands of known actors. What is the direction of his thinking on that?

[Oliver Dowden]

As ever, my right hon. Friend raises an erudite question. My disposition, and that of the Government, is that open source AI is an important basis upon which we can build many world-leading applications. We can see companies in this country growing at a fast pace by developing innovative AI off the back of open source. Of course, there are risks associated with it, but there is a high bar to be met before the Government would start imposing additional regulatory burdens on open source AI, given the associated benefits for economic growth.