13th Jun 2025 14:10
(Alliance News) - The UK government has been warned at Westminster over offshoring "incalculably valuable" UK health and security data, which artificial intelligence giants are lobbying to get hold of.
Concerns have been raised over overseas access to the rich trove of British-held statistics in the wake of a bitter stand-off in Parliament over attempts to prevent the creative industries being ripped off by tech giants.
The controversy centred on fears of AI companies using copyrighted work without permission, with the government accused of "supporting thieves".
A leading critic of the Labour administration's stance was the filmmaker Beeban Kidron, who used a parliamentary debate to highlight the importance of the nation's sovereign data asset, which carried with it profound ethical and economic implications.
The independent crossbencher stressed the need for the "precious" information to benefit both UK people and businesses and pressed the government over "terms of engagement" on its use, in the light of the recent AI copyright row.
She made her comments as calls were made in Parliament to nurture homegrown technology start-ups.
Kidron argued valuing data would support the objective "of ensuring that the tech revolution is a success in the UK".
She told peers she had been contacted by an industry insider who said major tech companies were heavily lobbying government to share NHS patient data with the promise of streamlining health service bureaucracy.
Kidron said: "Now sharing the entire UK population's NHS data is an enormous decision, and it has privacy implications, it has cost implications.
"But possibly the key point for today's debate is that it has profound implications on who, how and on what basis, and importantly, what jurisdiction that benefits accrue from innovations and commercial products and services that may never have been created without that help, without the help of that data set.
"This is a serious issue, even if patient records were shared with a UK company, but even more so if it's to be shared with a company headquartered overseas.
"This bears similarities to the arguments we've had for so many weeks, a concern that the government is being primed to share something of deep, personal importance to its citizens, something in this case, that was paid for by the public purse and then the other case belongs to other private owners, with the corresponding economic concern that British people may see little gain, or indeed may have to meet the cost of accessing the fruits of their own data.
"And my correspondent worried out loud that the government was going to be hoodwinked out of a true national resource.
"A similar debate is going on around the UK CCTV footage also of enormous interest to AI companies."
She added: "And is that what we want to do with our precious data? And if yes, are there terms of engagement, or is it like the copyright debate going to have no regulation, no powers, no upholding UK values and laws.
"More broadly, CCTV footage is some of the most valuable in the world because it shows people's movement at vast scale.
"That is what is needed to train the model, if we think about it as being what YouTube data is for [Alphabet Inc's] Google, it is almost, incalculably valuable. I just wonder if our data, as well as our funding, might be used to keep companies in the UK for some time longer."
Kidron went on: "We need our data policy to benefit UK people and businesses. We need transparency from government about the deals it's making, because they all shape our economy, democracy and national identity.
"All the government's moves to improve skills, infrastructure and energy price so that the UK AI community can thrive are extremely welcome, but on the issue of data, we must have a bigger vision than offshoring the value of our data to overseas."
Responding, technology minister Maggie Jones said the point about the information being a sovereign data asset "have been taken on board".
She added: "The NHS only allows access to health data when it benefits health and care, and we never sell the data."
Peers were debating a Lords report which warned the UK risks becoming an "incubator economy", where innovative UK firms develop before being sold or moving abroad.
Former chair of the Communications & Digital Committee Tina Stowell pointed to British quantum computing start-up Oxford Ionics being snapped up this week by US-based IonQ in a deal worth GBP738 million.
While congratulating the firm's founder on their success, Stowell said: "I am genuinely sorry about its loss to the UK as a British business, even if, under new ownership, it continues to operate here.
"What we have seen this week is another example of a worrying trend."
She argued that the UK was "a great place to begin, but too often it is other countries that get to cash in".
Stowell added: "If we are serious about growth and retaining our position as a global leader in the tech sector, this situation has to change."
By Nick Lester, Chief Lords Reporter
Press Association: News
source: PA
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