Category: Press Releases

The press release issued by the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology on 16 August 2025.

Patients and frontline staff could see huge benefits from new AI helping people out of hospital quicker and slashing bureaucracy.

Patients could get home to family and off busy wards more quickly, thanks to game-changing AI that could help write the documents that are needed to discharge people from hospital.

The cutting-edge technology will help cut waiting lists, by giving frontline staff the precious gift of time and making care more efficient so that loved ones return to the comfort of their homes quickly. Currently being developed at Chelsea and Westminster NHS Trust, it is one of many projects to receive backing from the Prime Minister as part of the AI Exemplars programme.

The AI-assisted tool could deliver the support that NHS staff have been crying out for – helping doctors to draft discharge documents faster by extracting key details from medical records, such as diagnoses and test results, using a large language model.  After a full review from a medical expert responsible for the patient, these documents are then used to discharge a patient from a ward and refer them to other care services that may be needed.

It would radically improve an outdated system that can leave patients on wards unnecessarily for hours, waiting for time-pressed doctors providing urgent care to sit down and fill in forms before they can go home. In some cases, the current system for writing discharge summaries can also inaccurately record basic patient details – like what treatment they’ve had, or changes to medication – and put them in harms way.

Another project announced today, ‘Justice Transcribe’, will be transformational for Probation Officers – by helping to transcribe and take notes in their meetings with offenders after they leave prison. The technology, which was found to halve the time officers spent organising notes between meetings and in their personal time, is set to be scaled to all 12,000 probation officers following the pilot phase outcome.

Projects being announced today as part of the Prime Minister’s AI Exemplars programme are prime examples of how the government wants to use AI across the public sector to make people’s lives easier and help deliver the Plan for Change. Over the coming months, these exemplars will be developed and trialled, with those showing the most promise potentially rolled out more widely. It follows the Prime Minister’s approach that people should not spend their time on tasks that AI can do quicker and better.

Speaking on a visit to Chelsea and Westminster Hospital, Technology Secretary Peter Kyle said:

This is exactly the kind of change we need: AI being used to give doctors, probation officers and other key workers more time to focus on delivering better outcomes and speeding up vital services.

This government inherited a public sector decimated by years of under-investment and is crying out for reform. These AI Exemplars show the best ways in which we’re using tech to build a smarter, more efficient state.

When we get this right across government, we’re talking about unlocking £45 billion in productivity gains – delivering our Plan for Change and investing in growth not bureaucracy.

Health and Social Care Secretary Wes Streeting said:

This potentially transformational discharge tool is a prime example of how we’re shifting from analogue to digital as part of our 10 Year Health Plan.

We’re using cutting-edge technology to build an NHS fit for the future and tackle the hospital backlogs that have left too many people waiting too long.

Doctors will spend less time on paperwork and more time with patients, getting people home to their families faster and freeing up beds for those who need them most.

The NHS Federated Data Platform, a system designed to connect IT across health and care services, is hosting the AI-assisted discharge summaries tool. This means that it can handover information to different care services in an efficient and secure way, while also making it easier to use the technology across the country if tests are successful.

Planning

The AI Exemplars programme will also include the ‘Extract’ tool, which will standardise data faster by converting decades-old, handwritten planning documents and maps into data in minutes. It will power new types of planning software to slash the 250,000 estimated hours spent by planning officers each year manually checking these documents.

Schools

Other technology backed by the programme, the ‘AI Content Store’, will also help make more accurate AI tools to support teachers to mark work and plan lessons – ensuring they are able to spend more time helping children in the classroom with face-to-face teaching, supporting the government’s mission to break down barriers to opportunity.

Justice

A further tool in the programme is ‘Justice Transcribe’. Early feedback from probation officers has shown that the technology allows them to focus on the personal, and often emotive meetings with offenders, instead of having to interrupt to take notes and clarify details.

Civil service

The suite of AI tools known as ‘Humphrey’, that helps make the civil service more efficient, is also included in the package. It comes as ‘Consult’, a tool in the package, analyses the thousands of responses any government consultation might receive in hours, before presenting policy makers and experts with interactive dashboards to explore what the public are saying directly.

It has been the first AI tool to undergo testing against a new ‘social readiness’ standard, where the tech was shared with members of the public to get their views on the value it adds, the strength of safeguards in place and the risks associated with using the technology.  Members of the public noted that Consult is well targeted to replace an “old school process” that is very “archaic” and ripe for improvement with AI.

The independent report, completed after deliberative focus groups by the Centre for Collective Intelligence at Nesta, a charity focused on innovation for the public good, found that 82% of people felt positive or neutral about the use of the technology across government.

Notes to editors

With more to be announced in the coming months, AI Exemplars include:

• Justice Transcribe, Ministry of Justice.
• ‘Humphrey’, Department for Science, Innovation and Technology.
• Education Content store, Department for Education.
• AI Tax Compliance, HMRC.
• ‘Extract’ and the Digital Planning Programme, Department for Science, Innovation and Technology and Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government.
• ‘Minute’ for Local Government, Department for Science, Innovation and Technology.
• GOV.UK Chat, Department for Science, Innovation and Technology.
• AI for diagnostics, NHS.

The press release issued by the Department of Science, Innovation and Technology on 16 August 2025.

AI agents could soon take on boring life admin by dealing with public services on your behalf – from filling in forms to completing applications and booking appointments.

AI agents could soon take on boring life admin by dealing with public services on your behalf – from filling in forms to completing applications and booking appointments, as the UK government plans trials to save people time and modernise the state.

Agentic AI is unique in that it can reliably complete basic admin tasks for people as well as provide tailored support for them, by putting in a prompt and watching it do the work for them. Acting on behalf of people, AI agents from private companies can be used to book flights, shop around for the best deal online, or book restaurants and activities from a holiday itinerary.

On Monday, the government will invite specialist companies who have started working with this type of cutting-edge AI to team up with in-house Whitehall experts to test this technology together. This includes exploring if agentic AI can help get young people into work by supporting them to take the next step in their education, find the best apprenticeship for their circumstances, provide custom career guidance and more.

In the first instance the tool could be trialled to help people with employment and skills but if successful, the government will experiment to see if agentic AI can help with other life milestones. For example, when moving home a government-built AI agent could help you update an address on your digital driving licence, register you with a new GP, register you in the correct constituency to vote and more.

Taking a new experimental approach recommended in the AI Opportunities Action Plan, the development of the technology will follow a “test and learn” approach that could be rolled out across the country from late 2027 – and builds on the early success of GOV.UK Chat, an experimental generative AI chatbot which is being developed in government.

UK Technology Secretary Peter Kyle said:

We can entirely rethink and reshape how public services help people through crucial life moments using the power of emerging AI technology. Using agentic AI to its full potential, we could provide a level of service to citizens across the country that was previously unimaginable – helping people to find better career opportunities, avoid wasting their time on government admin and more.

We are asking the world’s brightest AI developers to work in collaboration with our own brilliant AI teams as we test how valuable their latest tech can be in helping people in their day-to-day lives. At each step, we’ll only progress if the technology can be used in a safe and reliable way – but if it works, we could be the first country in the world to use AI agents at scale.

The technology, which would be entirely optional to use, could also save people hours of headaches by dealing with dozens of different agencies and government officials at once on their behalf.

To deliver this, the government is today asking for frontier AI labs to share their expertise and dedicate AI specialists to build a prototype of the technology over six-to-twelve months. Together, with government AI experts, a hybrid team will prove what’s possible in applying this new technology to public services, while the UK government will maintain ownership of the product into the future.

The project will be the first “National AI Tender” issued following the AI Opportunities Action Plan, a new method that seeks to build cutting-edge AI solutions to improve public services across the country.

It will follow a “Scan, Pilot, Scale” approach recommended by the AI Opportunities Action Plan, with the tender marking the start of the “Pilot” phase where the government will work with leading AI labs to see whether the technology available is ready to reliably deliver on this ambition.

The technology will be built in small and iterative stages, meaning it is consistently being evaluated and rigorously tested to make sure it is ultimately reliable and accurate enough to be used by people across the country when it’s ready.

The completed “Scan” phase included some user research to test where agentic AI could be most helpful, and some early prototyping and exploration of what data is already available to make further development possible.

Throughout, the project will be evaluated before it progresses to the next stage. If it is successful at each stage, an agentic AI solution could be rolled out across the country from the end of 2027.

It comes ahead of the Prime Minister announcing a wider series of AI Exemplars tomorrow, where he will set out several ways in which AI is being used across the public sector to speed up services, save money and improve outcomes for citizens.

The list will include the “Extract” tool, which will standardise data faster by converting decades-old, handwritten planning documents and maps into data in minutes. It will power new types of planning software to slash the 250,000 estimated hours spent by planning officers each year manually checking these documents.

The press release issued by the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology on 15 August 2025.

Government launches AI crime prevention challenge to support safer streets.

Criminals hell bent on making others’ lives a misery face being stopped before they can strike through cutting edge mapping technology, supported by AI, to be rolled out by 2030, Technology Secretary Peter Kyle has announced today (Friday 15 August).

Innovators have been tasked with developing a detailed real time and interactive crime map that spans England and Wales and can detect, track and predict where devastating knife crime is likely to occur or spot early warning signs of anti-social behaviour before it spirals out of control – giving police the intel they need to step in and keep the public safe.

It will be rooted in advanced AI that will examine how to bring together data shared between police, councils and social services, including criminal records, previous incident locations and behavioural patterns of known offenders.

The map will identify where crime is concentrating so law enforcement and partners can direct their resources as needed and help prevent further victims.

The Concentrations of Crime Data Challenge – delivered by UKRI – sets teams from business, universities and beyond a clear and measurable target of coming together to develop the solution to be operational across England and Wales by 2030 and is part of the government’s £500 million R&D Missions Accelerator Programme.

As part of an initial £4 million government investment, teams will deliver initial prototypes to enhance the mapping system by April 2026 – a crucial milestone that supports the Safer Streets Mission as part of our Plan for Change, which aims to halve knife crime and Violence Against Women and Girls within a decade.

Whilst visiting the Met Police, Science and Technology Secretary, Peter Kyle said:

Cutting-edge technology like AI can improve our lives in so many ways, including in keeping us safe, which is why we’re putting it to work for victims over vandals, the law-abiding majority over the lawbreakers.

Our police officers are at their best when they join up to prevent crime rather than react to it, and R&D can deliver crucial tools for them to stay one step ahead of potential dangers to the public and property – keeping our streets safe and delivering on our Plan for Change.

Minister for Policing and Crime Prevention, Dame Diana Johnson, said:

As criminal networks keep evolving with technology, so too must our response. We are giving police the tools they need to make our streets safer, and this crime map will be a powerful tool, building on the expanded rollout of live facial recognition vans we unveiled this week.

As part of our Plan for Change, we are investing in AI and other innovations that will help us be smarter on crime, staying ahead of the curve and prevent it from happening in the first place.

The challenge builds on existing Home Office work, including sophisticated mapping technologies targeting knife crime hotspots and the summer-long Safer Streets Initiative tackling town centre crime, taking this foundation further through enhanced research, expanded data sources and deeper analysis to better understand crime patterns and measure the impact of interventions.

The Safer Streets Mission also supports the government’s commitment to put 13,000 additional police officers, PCSOs and special constables into neighbourhood policing roles. Every neighbourhood will have a named, contactable officer dealing with local issues.

This announcement is the second challenge to be announced as part of the Programme, building on our Clean Energy challenge aiming to deliver cheaper bills for households across the UK by shifting electricity demand during evenings and weekends by two gigawatts by 2030 – the equivalent of 1.5 million homes.

Further challenges will be announced on how science and technology can build an NHS fit for the future, break down barriers to opportunity and drive growth to deliver on the government’s Plan for Change.

John Hayward-Cripps, CEO of Neighbourhood Watch said:

We welcome the announcement of this challenge which will bring together experts and practitioners at the cutting edge of crime, data and technology, to create an operational mapping system which we hope will enable people to feel safer and more secure in their homes and local neighbourhoods.

The map will pool a wealth of valuable crime data and enable law enforcement to target their resources more effectively at a local level and help prevent further victims of crime. As an organisation that strives to build a society where neighbours are more connected, safer, and active in their communities, we welcome this laser focus on harnessing data and tech to prevent crime at the local level.

Patrick Green, CEO of The Ben Kinsella Trust said:

We wholeheartedly welcome the government’s announcement on using AI to predict and prevent crime. This forward-thinking approach, which focuses on providing police with preventative tools to proactively intervene, aligns perfectly with the core mission of the Ben Kinsella Trust.

For 17 years, our work has been driven by the belief that prevention is the most powerful tool against crime, especially knife crime. By reaching young people early and educating them on the dangers and consequences of knife crime, we empower them to make safer choices.

This new initiative provides a powerful technological extension of that ethos, it demonstrates that the government recognises the immense value of prevention and is investing in innovative solutions to support our police officers in their vital work of keeping the public safe.

Rebecca Bryant, CEO of Resolve said:

This is a landmark moment for innovation in community safety. The Safer Streets mission and the Concentrations of Crime Data Challenge show a real commitment to harnessing technology for public good. At Resolve, we know that data alone isn’t enough as how we apply it really matters with a clear focus on an ethical and collaborative approach, all of which can make such a difference for communities. We’re proud to support this initiative and will continue championing the voices of practitioners who turn insight into impact every day.

Matthew Evans, Director of Markets and Chief Operating Office, techUK said:

This is a forward thinking step toward building safer, stronger communities. By harnessing cutting-edge AI alongside robust data sharing between police, councils, and social services, this initiative showcases the true potential of interoperability. Seamless collaboration across agencies will enable earlier detection of patterns, smarter allocation of resources, and more targeted interventions, helping to prevent harm before it occurs and better protect the public.

Tracey Burley, Chief Executive of St Giles, said:

Technology can play a role in tackling complex issues like knife crime – but only if used with care, recognising that individuals can be both victims and perpetrators, and that certain communities risk being unfairly profiled. Any technological solution must go hand in hand with proven measures such as early intervention for those at risk, and tackling the root causes – poverty, inequality and lack of opportunity.