A government-built AI tool was used to inform the recent decision to abolish the water and sewerage regulator Ofwat.
The tool, called Consult, was built for the UK government as a way to speed up the analysis of the more than 50,000 responses to a review of the water sector.
According to the government, the use of Consult was a success, with the tool found to be “at least as accurate and reliable as humans” whilst reducing the amount of time experts had to spend checking the results to 22 hours.
The technology was said to have sped up and supported the ultimate decision to scrap the regulator.
Consult is part of the Humphrey suite of UK public sector AI tools. The Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) hopes it will save officials collectively from 75,000 days of manual analysis every year.
“This shows the huge potential for technology and AI to deliver better and more efficient public services for the public and provide better value for the taxpayer,” said Digital Government Minister Ian Murray.
“By taking on the basic admin, Consult is giving staff time to focus on what matters – taking action to fix public services. In the process, it could save the taxpayer hundreds of thousands of pounds.”