Select committee: Defence Committee
Conclusion 28
2nd Report - Developing AI capacity and expertise in UK defence
Published 10 Jan 2025
Addressed to Ministry of Defence
Defence Committee All items in this report Report on parliament.uk ↗
Conclusion (the committee's words)
Defence collects masses of data that could potentially be used to train defence AI models, but this data is not always easily accessible to those developing defence software. To some extent this is an inevitable challenge when working with sensitive data of the kind Defence holds, but it is a challenge that must be overcome if the UK is to apply AI to defence problems. Even at lower or unclassified levels of data, there is enormous unrealised potential in the data held by Defence that could be unlocked by improving the way data is collected, labelled and shared. The 2021 Data Strategy for Defence shows that MOD has diagnosed the problem and has the right ambitions, but our evidence shows that many of the issues identified in the Data Strategy persist. (Conclusion, Paragraph 84)
From: Defence Committee, 2nd Report - Developing AI capacity and expertise in UK defence (HC 590), 10 January 2025
Government response
The government responded to the whole report on 4 April 2025.
Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.The government welcomes the report and agrees with most recommendations, in several cases in general terms or subject to the outcome of the Strategic Defence Review.
- On the Strategic Defence Review, it "agrees in general terms" that specific actions should normalise AI use, though the response "cannot pre-empt the findings of the SDR".
- On the Defence AI Strategy, it believes it is "more pertinent to focus on shaping our future approach" and anticipates the need to refresh its strategic approach, while agreeing that specific, measurable actions will be essential.
- On a new fund to scale innovations, it says ongoing discussions with HM Treasury "prevent a direct response", and will raise the recommendation with the Treasury "where it is appropriate to do so".
- On the Digital Strategy for Defence, it "partially agrees" and plans a refreshed digital strategy with an implementation plan and metrics; it says the Digital Backbone has no completion date.