Britain cannot let aritificial intelligence be ruled by “tech bros and oligarchs”, the AI minister has said.
Kanishka Narayan told the BBC’s Political Thinking podcast that dealing with the technology requires not only regulation, but “building capability and capacity in the state” too.
He compared AI to the Victorian-era Industrial Revolution, but said the country needed to transition better than it did back then.
His comments were recorded the day before Barclays banking group announced it was cutting 5,000 jobs in an AI-led efficiency drive.
He was also speaking before another major AI-related development – the discovery of a cyber-security flaw affecting millions of websites, which was found with the help of AI.
Narayan, who became the UK’s first cabinet minister for AI when he was appointed by Prime Minister Andy Burnham in July, said the scale of the technological change was “something that we haven’t seen for decades and decades”.
“It is comparable and in some ways exceeds the Industrial Revolution,” he said, referencing the shift from a predominantly agricultural economy to industrial and manufacturing sectors between about 1750 and 1900.
The Labour MP told the BBC’s Nick Robinson that Britain needed to avoid what happened in the Industrial Revolution where “the outcome as a whole was good for the country, but the transition was extremely painful for too many people”.
“The fundamental thing is that the British public and democracy has to assert power rather than leave it to tech bros and oligarchs,” he added.
He did not name any specific companies or tech bosses.
