“Artificial Intelligence is a transformative technology that is being used throughout the Private and Public Sectors nationally and globally and is playing an improving and progressive role. My question comes in two parts:
Firstly: What steps are Carmarthenshire County Council currently taking regarding Artificial Intelligence to ensure that this Council keeps up with key trends and developments and that it draws on the best practice other Local Authorities and Public Sector Organisations in the U.K. are implementing and innovating on.
Secondly: Looking to the future; how is this Council aiming to maximise the benefits of Artificial Intelligence so that viable opportunities and practices can be engaged, whilst also recognising, and dealing with the challenges this technology will undoubtedly raise as it progresses.”
Minutes:
Question by Cllr. James:
“Artificial Intelligence is a transformative technology that is being used throughout the Private and Public Sectors nationally and globally and is playing an improving and progressive role. My question comes in two parts:
Firstly: What steps are Carmarthenshire County Council currently taking regarding Artificial Intelligence to ensure that this Council keeps up with key trends and developments and that it draws on the best practice of other Local Authorities and Public Sector Organisations in the U.K. are implementing and innovating on.
Secondly: Looking to the future; how is this Council aiming to maximise the benefits of Artificial Intelligence so that viable opportunities and practices can be engaged, whilst also recognising, and dealing with the challenges this technology will undoubtedly raise as it progresses.”
Response by Cllr. Price:
“In response to the first question, we have been following developments within AI for some time and our officers are aware of the latest developments and are in constant contact with industry experts, private sector partners and suppliers. We are also involved with a variety of public sector forums and work streams, working with the WLGA, the Centre for Digital Public Services and the Welsh Government to make sure that we are well placed to apply the best practices of Local Authorities and other public sector organisations in relation to AI.
The connections we have already made and our presence in these Forums helps us to share learning and note the most beneficial opportunities for Carmarthenshire. They also provide vital information about the possible risks and challenges with AI, allowing us to prepare with that in mind. For us to truly embrace AI we need to understand the business case, the cost, the benefits etc case by case. It is also essential that we understand the likely impact of this technology on our public services, on residents and of course our workforce in order to make sure that our adoption of this is moral and safe.
We will continue to take the necessary steps and our relationships with public and private sector partners to make sure that Carmarthenshire keeps up with key trends and developments in AI. We are already trialling the use of AI in relation to two HR processes and our Digital Transformation Board is looking at other departments where we can use and learn through use of AI. For example, one of the processes, we have a bot within the HR Department which was introduced recently, and the bot is able to process information 24 hours a day and is more effective than the previous process.
There are savings obviously as well as better process effectiveness. We are monitoring this so that the monitoring people are working with our department to use AI to similes’ our contract managing processes in HR. This will reduce our use of occasional staff and will provide improvements for services including accelerating processes. There is of course a core issue in terms of AI, is it replacing jobs and shrinking the workforce.
We are on an AI journey, in the initial phase and we are working closely with unions and we will continue to do that as we develop our use of AI in Carmarthenshire. Indeed, the use of AI has been a discussion point in our meetings with our union colleagues and we have given assurance that using AI will not be a direct threat to appointing new staff. In response to the second part of the question, our officers at the moment are writing a position statement on AI for the Council. The paper will be presented to the Transformation Board during the autumn this year and as well as that our new digital strategy for Carmarthenshire for the next few years, up to 2027, is being worked on at the moment. This new digital strategy will focus significantly on innovation including AI of course and as part of developing this strategy, for the first time we will be undertaking a public consultation making sure that residents and businesses do have the opportunity to give their views and expectations. I hope that gives you an overview.”
Supplementary Question by Cllr. James:
“Very comprehensive and informative answer from the Leader which shows how seriously you yourself and the County Council are taking this subject. Can you initiate a presentation or a seminar in the near future on this most important subject so we know more about it and we have that information to take out to residents who might ask us questions and we will have something to give them as answers. We don’t know much about it and some people say A1 instead of AI as that is how much people have grasped it so far. But it is important, it is progressive throughout the world globally, so it is important that we get this knowledge as well. If you could initiate a seminar or a presentation for us on this sometime in the future.”
Response by Cllr. Price:
“As you say, this is something new for us. I am learning as well. It is something that is becoming more apparent for us as a public sector and it’s important that we all understand what is to come and the challenges and the risks as I mentioned regarding staffing etc. We had a discussion on this item as part of our overview as a Cabinet about two weeks ago I think and quite a lot of work is taking place in this area across the Council and as I mentioned earlier, as we go out to consultation on this strategy, we want to make sure that residents and businesses specifically feed into it because the private sector has a vital role to develop this agenda in the county. In relation to members that is something that we have discussed with officers and we see a specific seminar for members as an important part of that consultation in terms of the new strategy. So, to answer the question, there will be a seminar and hopefully we can get that in place over the next few months.”