Asked by
To ask His Majesty’s Government how the Department for Work and
Pensions is using artificial intelligence and what governance
process is in place for such use.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Work
and Pensions () (Con)
My Lords, DWP has used forms of AI for some time and we continue
to investigate new opportunities. This includes looking at how
generative AI can help us deliver high-quality services to
improve customer experience and colleague efficiency. We are
aware of the transformative benefits of AI, as well as the
potential risks. We have created the AI Lighthouse programme to
explore opportunities, and we have a framework ensuring that we
work safely, ethically and transparently.
(Lab)
My Lords, this Question has become topical since I tabled it,
since the Government have started to take powers to look into the
bank account of every pensioner in the country. But that has made
me even keener to understand exactly how DWP is using AI. Can the
Minister tell the House whether it is used to select people for
health reassessments, or to decide who to investigate or who to
sanction? If so, what safeguards are in place to ensure that it
is used transparently and fairly? How do we avoid it becoming a
sort of digital version of stop and search?
(Con)
I hope I can reassure the noble Baroness that we already have a
proven track record in delivering technology in a responsible and
well-governed way. We have extended our governance to include an
AI steering board and an assurance and advisory group. DWP always
ensures that appropriate safeguards are in place for the
proportionate, ethical and legal use of data, with internal
monitoring protocols adhered to. I further reassure her that the
Cabinet Office’s Central Digital and Data Office has recognised
our Lighthouse programme’s safe acceleration framework as an
exemplar for AI development in government.
(Con)
My Lords, given that the DWP’s proposed total expenditure for
2023-24 is a staggering £279.3 billion, can my noble friend tell
the House whether this use of AI will contribute and is
contributing to cost efficiencies within the department?
(Con)
I can reassure my noble friend that it will. I shall give a bit
of granular detail: a 2021 DSIT report highlighted the potential
impact of AI on the UK labour market, and this of course includes
DWP. Automation is forecast to increase, rising from an estimated
7% to 30%, but I can reassure my noble friend that, with the
changes, there will be a net gain. We have an average of about
900,000 employees per quarter moving from one job to another, so
I can reassure my noble friend that my department’s employees
will reduce, but there will be opportunities for those in AI.
of Childs Hill (LD)
My Lords, as the Minister said, the Government are rolling out
massively complex new systems, with significant risk to claimants
because they have not got their original systems in order. We
hear constant reports of backlogs at the Future Pension Centre,
payments for national insurance credits being lost within the
system and more and more historic pension errors coming to light
when it comes to things such as home responsibilities protection.
Can the Minister update the House on the steps to get those
existing systems in order and on what learning exercises will be
carried out to ensure that no such errors will be carried forward
on the new and potentially more powerful systems that he has
outlined?
(Con)
We are certainly working very hard to look at and mitigate
delays, and AI will over time be a game-changer for that. To
manage and mitigate risk, we have produced a risk framework, in
line with the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology.
We are setting out AI governance and an approach to AI enablement
which will be transformational.
(Lab)
My Lords, I shall pick up on what my noble friend said about
digital stop and search, because there is growing concern about
the potential for hidden bias in the use of algorithms to detect
social security fraud. What steps has the DWP taken to prevent
such bias, with potentially discriminatory outcomes?
(Con)
The noble Baroness raises an important point. We are committed to
building trust in our use of AI and are fully aware of the risks
of the technology, as discussed at the UK AI safety summit. Where
AI is used to assist its activities in the prevention and
detection of fraud within UC applications, DWP always ensures
appropriate safeguards, and bias is something we are very alive
to. It will very much depend on the input of data and we have
some risk profiles in place to ensure that we adopt best practice
in that respect.
(Con)
My Lords, given the appalling amount of fraud within the DWP,
costing billions per year, surely we should welcome the fact that
DWP is using AI and algorithms to target this problem. The key is
presumably that, once AI has reached a conclusion, actual human
beings should review the situation. Can the Minister tell the
House whether the DWP has robust internal quality assessment
procedures?
(Con)
There are couple of questions there. We continue to explore the
potential of AI in combating fraud. This includes the integrated
risk and intelligence service, using AI to assist in identifying
possible fraud in processing universal credit advances. To answer
my noble friend’s question, importantly, DWP does not use AI to
replace human judgment when considering the potential for
incorrectness to either determine or deny payment to a claimant.
The NAO and the ICO looked at this issue recently and found no
areas of immediate concern.
(Lab)
My Lords, the issue that my noble friend raised about access to
millions of people’s bank accounts came up at a very late
stage—Report—of Commons dealings with the Data Protection and
Digital Information Bill. Can the Minister outline why such
contentious measures were introduced only after the line-by-line
consideration of the Bill in the elected House? Why did the
Government refuse the Opposition’s request that the legislation
go back to Committee, as did the Online Safety Bill in the last
Session? Can the Minister justify why this very contentious piece
of legislation is being rushed through?
(Con)
I will not be drawn into answering questions on that, but I can
say that it is important that the scrutiny of the Bill is done in
an effective way and, of course, this House is very good at doing
that. As I have mentioned before, it is very important that there
is trust in AI solutions; this must be a prevalent issue among
all users of AI.
(CB)
Will this AI enable people who are on social security to get a
better deal and get off social security, so that we can tap into
the skills and abilities of millions of people who are caught in
the Bastille of poverty and social security?
(Con)
Yes, and I can outline that a lot of very good work has been done
so far. As I said earlier, the work still has to include human
judgment, but AI is being used to assist with improving on
repetitive processes for staff. We are introducing conversational
platforms for triaging, which will lead directly to having a
human face. The whole point is to speed up the process and
include more human judgment in ensuring that more people get into
work, and faster.
(Lab)
Has the Minister seen the Paradot website? If not, will he look
at it? Is the department examining whether the buddy concept
developed there could be used in the department that he
represents and in other government departments, and what the
consequences of using that in government service would be?
(Con)
I am not aware of that, but I will most certainly look at it.
(LD)
Can the Minister say what percentage of staff within the
department are fully skilled and trained on the use, application
and assessment of AI decisions?
(Con)
I will need to write to the noble Lord with those specific
figures.
(Lab)
The Minister has said repeatedly that he wants the public to have
trust in the use of AI in the system. Can he therefore tell us
what proportion of cases where AI has been used are subsequently
checked by a human? Will he publish the results of that analysis
to show whether the AI decisions are the same as human decisions,
or perhaps better, or worse?
(Con)
I can give the noble Lord some reassurance on the processes that
we have in place. AI is an evolving, iterative process and it is
important to highlight the fact that we have a test- and-learn
approach. We must proceed with extreme caution in what we are
doing. Test-and-learn means that we need to get to a point where
we are assured that this will work and that nobody will be
affected detrimentally. Then we can accelerate our programmes.
