Specialist AI technology developed by the UK government has played a key role in accelerating policy decisions, including the recent move to abolish Ofwat, by streamlining the analysis of public consultation responses.
The AI tool, part of the government’s ‘Humphrey’ suite, sorted over 50,000 responses into key themes in just two hours, costing only £240. Human experts then spent 22 hours verifying the results, allowing policy teams to focus on insights rather than manual sorting.
The tool, known as ‘Consult’, was benchmarked against two expert groups and matched their thematic analysis 83% of the time, outperforming the experts’ own agreement rate of 55%. It has previously supported consultations on non-surgical cosmetics in Scotland and the Digital Inclusion Action Plan, demonstrating its versatility and accuracy.
The technology is expected to save officials 75,000 days of manual analysis annually, cutting £20 million in staffing costs and helping build a more agile, responsive government aligned with the Plan for Change.
Ian Murray, Digital Government Minister, said:
“This shows the huge potential for technology and AI to deliver better and more efficient public services for the public and provide better value for the taxpayer.
“By taking on the basic admin, Consult is giving staff time to focus on what matters – taking action to fix public services. In the process, it could save the taxpayer hundreds of thousands of pounds.”
Engineers are now developing AI Exemplars to support planning decisions, probation services, and more—part of the Prime Minister’s vision to harness AI for public good.
Image credit: iStock
