The All-Party Parliamentary Group on the Future of Work (APPG) is launching a new report into The New Frontier: Artificial Intelligence at Work. This is the final report from the APPG’s inquiry into AI and surveillance in the workplace. The inquiry finds that AI is transforming work and working lives across the country in ways that have plainly outpaced, or avoid, the existing regimes for regulation and affecting employee mental health.
The APPG for the Future of Work is launching a new report into The New Frontier: Artificial Intelligence at Work.
This is the final report from the APPG’s inquiry into AI and surveillance in the workplace. The inquiry finds that AI is transforming work and working lives across the country in ways that have plainly outpaced, or avoid, the existing regimes for regulation.
In September 2021, the National AI Strategy was released and in early 2022 it will be followed with a white paper outlining the Government’s position on regulation. The evidence we have considered shows that there is an urgent need to bring forward robust proposals to protect people and safeguard our fundamental values.
The APPG finds that there has been a significant increase in use of surveillance and other AI technologies that control fundamental aspects of work. The practice, tools, and ethos of the gig economy are being embedded across essential sectors without due regard for adverse impacts on work and people. There are marked gaps in legal protection at individual, collective and corporate levels.
Key recommendations
1. An Accountability for Algorithms Act: The Act would establish a simple, new corporate and public sector duty to undertake, disclose and act on pre-emptive Algorithmic Impact Assessments (AIA).
2. Updating digital protection: The AAA would raise the floor of essential protection for workers in response to specific gaps in protection from adverse impacts of powerful but invisible algorithmic systems.
3. Enabling a partnership approach: To boost a partnership approach and recognise the collective dimension of data processing, some additional collective rights are needed for unions and specialist third sector organisations to exercise new duties on members or other groups’ behalf.
4. Enforcement in practice: The joint Digital Regulation Cooperation Forum (DRCF) should be expanded with new powers to create certification schemes, suspend use or impose terms and issue cross-cutting statutory guidance, to supplement the work of individual regulators and sector-specific standards.
5. Supporting human-centred AI: The principles of Good Work should be recognised as fundamental values, incorporating fundamental rights and freedoms under national and international law, to guide development and application of a human-centred AI Strategy.
The white paper and the National AI Strategy must take on board these recommendations in order to seize the potential of modern technology and improve future work and working lives across the United Kingdom in service of the public interest.