Patrick Vallance and TUC boss warn workers must be protected during AI revolution

While proponents argue that new artificial technology will boost growth and provide significant opportunities, there are fears that it could make many jobs obsolete.

A conference in Blyth entitled ‘The Past We Inherit, The Future We Build – AI and the North East’ featured keynote speeches and panel discussions on AI’s impact on employment, public services, infrastructure, energy and everyday life.

Among the speakers were the Government’s Science Minister Lord Patrick Vallance, who became a well-known figure during the coronavirus pandemic, as well as General Secretary of the TUC Paul Nowak.

Speaking at the event, Lord Valance said: “Places like Blyth and the wider North East know better than most how economic change can shape lives. When Britain has grown, this region has held power – but when the economy has shifted, communities here have too often felt it first.

“AI is not just a technological shift, it is a workforce shift; a community shift. There is a question of who benefits, who adapts and who gets left behind if we are not careful.

“Technological change can widen gaps if left unchecked.

“The North East AI growth zone is a flagship. The QTS site represents one of the largest AI works in Europe. Global investors are choosing the North East because of people, industrial capacity and energy assets.

“Investment of this scale can be a catalyst for renewal. The future we build depends on the choices we make now.

“AI adoption is the prize. AI can boost productivity, improve public services and create better living standards in places like Blyth and across the North East.

“AI brings huge potential in every area. With all that huge potential, just as we’ve had with previous technology, comes risks.

“We can’t do one without the other. It’s about making sure we know how we’re going to handle those, because we can use AI to make care across the health system faster, smarter and more coest effective.

“If we get this right, AI can support new growth, stronger communities and renewed pride of place. It can help write the next chapter of this region’s industrial story – one rooted in opportunity, capability and confidence.”

The event was organised by Blyth and Ashington MP Ian Lavery. The North East is home to an AI growth zone, with key developments including the QTS datacentre at Cambois and a Stargate UK base in North Tyneside’s Colbalt Park.

TUC boss Mr Nowak said: “It’s great to be back here in the North East. I was the TUC’s regional secretary here over two decades ago when the widespread application of AI was pretty much the stuff of science fiction , but now – 20 years on – this part of the world is a key part of the government’s national AI Growth Zone.

“I want to argue two key points, which at first sight might seem contradictory, but in reality I think are both true at the same time. AI is – and will be – a transformative technology.

“It has the potential to destroy jobs, to reshape whole industries, to deskill a generation of workers and to reinforce the inequalities which already tear at the fabric of our society. But AI also has the potential to boost productivity, to enhance and unleash human creativity and to deliver a digital dividend that could be used for the public good, not just for billionaires to send celebrities into space.

“Some jobs will go, others will change. And – as with any wave of technological change – new jobs will be created. We cannot and must not allow AI to unleash another wave of 1980s-style social and economic destruction.

“Blyth, like my hometown of Birkenhead, and like so many other towns across the North, the Midlands, Wales and Scotland, is a town scarred by deindustrialisation. Coal, shipbuilding, the Alcan aluminium plant – all gone and more recently, a promised gigafactory from British Volt – axed.

“So it is vital that we learn from the mistakes of the past. It is vital that we make the most of the investment in the massive new datacentre complex here in Blyth.

“We really can build and shape the future. We must make clear political choices to enable working people to thrive through the upheavals ahead.

“We can protect workers, regulate AI and make it a force for good, as well as a driver of disruption. AI is not some other-worldly force.

“It’s time to seize the moment, time to put workers first, time to make AI a genuine force for good.”