Government reveals AI sped up decision to axe Ofwat

The government has said that specialist AI tech helped to speed up its decision to abolish the Water Services Regulation Authority (Ofwat).

The tool, called Consult, was used to sort over 50,000 responses into key themes, making the Independent Water Commission (IWC) analysis more efficient and effective.

The AI tool categorised responses into themes in around two hours, costing only £240, with experts needing just 22 hours to check the results.

The government said the use of the tool meant that policy experts could focus on using themes and categorised responses to inform recommendations for their independent report, rather than sorting through tens of thousands of individual responses.

Alongside the AI-assisted thematic analysis, the team also completed detailed manual reviews of responses from stakeholders to ensure their perspectives were thoroughly considered.

The work of Consult was compared to two groups of experts, with the government finding that it agreed with one or both of the groups almost 83 per cent of the time, while the two human groups only agreed with each other 55 per cent of the time.

In May, Consult was used for the first time by the Scottish government to summarise responses to a live consultation for the first time.

It was used when the government was seeking views on how to regulate non-surgical cosmetic procedures such as lip fillers and laser hair removal following the rise of their use.

Reviewing comments from over 2,000 consultation responses using generative AI, the government said Consult identified key themes that feedback fell into across each of six qualitative questions.

Consult is part of Humphrey, a bundle of AI tools designed to speed up the work of civil servants and cut back time spent on admin and money spent on contractors.

Humphrey is part of the government’s plan to make better use of technology across public services, in a move that the government claims could result in as much as £45 billion in productivity savings.

The government said Consult will be used to analyse responses to other consultations to save employees from around 75,000 days of manual analysis each year which costs £20 million in staffing costs.

“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,” said digital government minister Ian Murray. “By taking on the basic admin, Consult is giving staff time to focus on what matters – taking action to fix public services.”