‘The Most Significant Industrial Revolution Of Our Time’: Labour’s Reuben Davidson On NZ’s AI Future

Midday
Report

In
the lead-up to November’s election, Midday Report is
speaking with the technology spokesperson for a range of
parties about their biggest hopes and fears with artificial
intelligence and the role of government in regulating the
technology. On Monday, Guyon Epsiner sat down with Labour’s
Economic Development, Science Technology spokesperson Reuben
Davidson.

In Reuben Davidson’s eyes the world is
looking at potentially the most significant industrial
revolution of a generation with Artificial Intelligence
(AI).

In an interview with Midday Report, he
said there was “enormous opportunity” with AI and the
government had a responsibility to get involved and help
navigate what that looked like for Aotearoa.

It was
hard to know what the impacts of AI would be in a decade,
Davidson said, but the speed of which it was morphing and
the speed of the uptake globally was
“unprecedented”.

“Questions need to start being
asked… given that few people know what it will look like
in 10 years we need to take a more active role to steer and
decide what we want it to look like the next 10 years. We
need to have a really clear framework for New Zealand and a
really clear plan on how we want to navigate our way through
this.”

Davidson believed the AI
strategy put forward by the current government wasn’t
“fit for purpose” and didn’t give New Zealanders a level of
security they needed or deserved.

For Labour, Davidson
said the key points would be creating an office of
AI.

“We see that need to be elevated right to the
Cabinet table with a single minister responsible that means
we can look after copyright frameworks… the impact of AI
on education… and have really clear rules for data
centres…”

He said there was also a need for an
independent online safety regulator.

“The government
need to have a really strong action plan to engage with this
it’s not acceptable anymore for the government to step back
and say we’re gonna wait and see what happens.

“We
need to actively shape and be involved in how it evolves to
serve us.”

Davidson said there was no question AI
would be disruptive to the workforce and the way it had
worked up until now.

“I think the urgency now is for
the government to map to see the kinds of roles being
impacted and acknowledge 12 to 18 months ago we weren’t
thinking it would be those roles.”

AI would create new
roles, he said, and new jobs as new technologies always had,
but what needed to be thought about was how to manage it and
ensure human skill was still being utilised.

Davidson
himself said he did use AI but only in a very “conscious”
way.

“I’m very aware when I’m doing online searches,
very aware of the role AI is playing in sorting and
selecting the information it is returning to me.

“I’m
very careful on checking the forms of information and the
sources…”

He said he normally used an AI product
created in Christchurch called Contented AI. He used it to
present his thoughts and ideas as words, but said he would
go through and edit to make sure it accurately reflected
what he was thinking and wanting to get forward.

“It’s
assisted my productivity… but I’m still actively involved
in all of those processes as opposed to relying on AI to do
my thinking for me.”

Davidson said his biggest fear
with AI was that the government didn’t take it seriously and
see the very real opportunities for New Zealand and didn’t
protect New Zealanders from the very real risks.

“As a
result, the power imbalance sits with big tech companies as
the decision makers as opposed to government engaging with
New Zealanders to really ensure we embrace the technology
and the huge advantages and productivity gains it will give
us to make sure we have AI that works for New
Zealanders.”

© Scoop Media