Societal Impact of AI: Government Policy Debate
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Susan Murray
Main Page: Susan Murray (Liberal Democrat - Mid Dunbartonshire)Department Debates - View all Susan Murray's debates with the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office
Societal Impact of AI: Government Policy
Susan Murray Excerpts(1 month ago)
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Susan Murray (Mid Dunbartonshire) (LD)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Ms McVey. I thank the hon. Member for Poole (Neil Duncan-Jordan) for securing a debate on a question that will shape every community in this country, including mine. I will try to focus on topics that have not been covered, including infrastructure.
In my Mid Dunbartonshire constituency, AI has recently been brought to the forefront of local debate. At Westerhill, near Bishopbriggs, a developer has proposed a 300 MW AI data centre with 500 MW of battery storage—nationally significant infrastructure on our doorstep. My constituents’ response has rightly been one of caution—not hostility and not blind welcome. They have serious concerns and questions: “What jobs will this bring, and for whom? What happens to the environment, to the grid, to water and to energy bills?”
Developments on this scale must be good neighbours and deliver community benefit that people can see, as well as skills, local employment and investment in the places that host them—not just high fences and, as the hon. Member for Dewsbury and Batley (Iqbal Mohamed) said, profits that are disseminated at a distance. That is how they will be judged by the communities who host them.
This is an international issue, and it has so far been dominated by US policy. Last month, the United States showed the first sign that it may not see us as being part of its team when it comes to AI access. On 12 June, the US Government ordered one of the US’s leading AI companies to cut off access to its two most advanced models for anyone who is not a US citizen—the first time that export controls have ever been applied to AI models. Access for British businesses and researchers was switched off overnight not because of anything we did, but because Trump decided to cut us off.
That is not a partnership; a vital technology that can be withdrawn at another Government’s whim is a chain around Britain’s neck. We cannot build our public services, our security and our economy on systems that can be cut off at a whim. It is clear that the UK must build its sovereign capacity—the data centres, skills and software needed to ensure that we are not locked out of the AI race.
Communities such as mine, which are being asked to host the infrastructure of that future, should share fairly in the rewards, and we must build public trust. The Liberal Democrat approach would make that possible, based on a cross-sector, principle-based framework to give innovators certainty and the public confidence, and to give transparency wherever AI is used in the public sector, so that people can understand the impact it is having on their lives.