What was the point of Rishi Sunak’s landmark AI summit at Bletchley Park? The Prime Minister has just given a press conference at the end of it in which he tried to underline his achievements. These included bringing together more than 100 of the leading AI nations and leading companies handling the technology and reaching a commitment to state-backed testing and evaluation before any AI technology is released.
For Sunak, Britain being at the front of conversations about AI is also about the country’s identity post-Brexit
He did, though, have to acknowledge that the UK is not going to be leading the world on AI safety and regulation. He made reference to the institutes set up by both the UK and the US – rather than just one institute as he has previously proposed. The US has not responded in the way that Sunak had hoped on this, to the extent that Kamala Harris did her own speech in London about the Biden administration’s policies, showing that they are not being led by the UK.
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