Artificial intelligence should be used as a catalyst for rethinking how Government works, with a national capacity to improve services for citizens, with fewer repetitive interactions, faster decisions and reduced waiting times, according to proposals to be considered by Ministers.
The adoption of AI across the public service is uneven, where it is used mainly in drafting, summarising and processing documents, according to proposals to be given to a new Cabinet subcommittee on the technology by the Department of Public Expenditure, which also has responsibility for digitalisation.
The paper on the use of AI in public service reform has been drawn up for a meeting of Ministers on Monday. It says AI should be used “to address material public service challenges, redesign services and processes to capitalise on the transformation potential of this technology to deliver significant and demonstrable public value”.
Next week’s meeting comes just days after Government signalled it wanted its €5 billion public service pay deal to facilitate its plans to drive greater adoption of AI across the State sector.
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However, a separate joint submission by the departments of Enterprise and Further and Higher Education, which will also be considered by the Cabinet subcommittee on AI, describes it as “a rapidly evolving disruptive technology”.
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The paper says AI is more likely to transform jobs than eliminate them, but notes higher risks for certain sectors and age cohorts.
“As with all technological transformations, some occupations will be displaced and new opportunities will emerge.”
AI is expected “to have significant impact on workplaces, occupations and the wider economy over the coming years”, it states.
“The scale and pace of change remain uncertain [and] the range of possibilities [run] from incremental change to existing roles to more profound and dramatic shifts in occupational structures and workforce composition.”
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In the context of significant uncertainty around the scale and pace of AI-driven change, it continues, no single Government intervention will be sufficient. It says evidence and intelligence must inform ongoing adjustments, while agility and adaptability will be critical to workforce resilience.
The Department of Public Expenditure paper says AI could be used to improve “the effectiveness and efficiency of public service provision, reducing administrative burden, increasing organisational capacity and enabling more effective use of information”. It says it could be used to “transform people and processes, not technology alone, by redesigning work, developing skills and actively redirecting released capacity to service improvement”.
“The opportunity now is to build a public service that is more intelligent, connected, responsive, resilient and productive by using AI to improve the work of public servants and deliver better services for citizens,” the paper says.
“This requires a move from dispersed adoption towards a co-ordinated national capability that supports public service transformation, strengthens organisational capacity and financial sustainability, and enables successful solutions to be reused and scaled across Government.”
The paper says the immediate priority is to translate such an approach into a practical whole-of-Government implementation programme, identifying priorities, strengthening organisational readiness and putting in place arrangements to monitor progress and outcomes.
“The ambition is to ensure that Ireland’s public service does not simply adopt AI, but uses it to fundamentally improve how Government works and how citizens experience public services.”
