Is the UK falling behind in protecting workers from Artificial Intelligence (AI)?
The words AI, ChatGPT and even robots are everywhere at the moment. People and companies are concerned but for different reasons. Companies need to ensure they are not left behind in the trend and potential cost saving of the ever growing knowledge and usage of AI however, individuals are worried about their jobs, livelihoods and what AI means for them and their role in the workplace.
Prospects, the leading tech trade union, has confirmed that in general workers are not happy about the lack of protection being offered around AI. Nearly 60% of workers in their recent poll would like to see the UK government regulate the use of generative AI technology such as ChatGPT in the workplace to help safeguard jobs.
Why are people worried?
Octopus Energy recently stated in a news article that they have found customer satisfaction is higher for emails written by AI over their staff. Although, they did comment that AI needs to be used responsibly and that checks and balances should be in place to ensure the use of AI enhances and creates jobs, rather than replaces them.
Many low skilled, administrative and entry level jobs could be at risk. AI has the potential to do jobs faster and cheaper and if customer/client satisfaction is higher then why wouldn’t businesses use this over human staff? And whilst the EU are implementing rules and regulations with regard to the use of AI in order to protect workers from losing their jobs to robots, the UK government is not currently taking steps to alleviate the risk individuals are feeling. A government spokesperson recently confirmed in a news article on the topic – “AI is set to fuel growth and create new highly-paid jobs throughout the UK, while allowing us to carry out our existing jobs more efficiently and safely”, but with little guidance in place, what should businesses be doing to benefit from AI but also protect their workers?
What can businesses do?
The immediate advantage to adopting AI is potentially faster and cheaper work for businesses which frees up workers for more complicated and profitable tasks. Although it is important that as a business you don’t lose sight of the bigger picture. AI might grow and be able to replace some junior tasks and roles but if we lose junior staff to AI technology we also lose the growth of industries as a gap will form where AI cannot fulfill the highly skilled jobs which are learned through experience. Who will the future leaders learn from? How will the senior roles be filled by those who lost out on experience to AI?
Businesses should focus on using AI as a learning tool, an aid to their workers to improve productivity and reduce monotonous repetitive tasks that can be easily automated, rather than implementing AI as a replacement for human workers.
AI could help to shape future business leaders as long as current business leaders understand and use the technology to their long-term advantage and not detriment.
How will employment law be affected?
The truth is we don’t yet know.
AI is set to have a large impact on the legal sector. Without guidance from the government we are unclear of the impacts. What we know now is that UK employment law will need to pick up the pace with the revolution to stay relevant and without government intervention this will be up to the Employment Tribunal and Courts.
We suspect that the impact of AI will continue to change and update and in turn we will keep you up to date with its impacts.
For any further information regarding AI and your workforce, or if you have a query on another area of employment law, please contact the Employment Law Team via the details below.
If you want to hear more about employment law updates and changes, you can also find details of our other upcoming events here: Events | BRM Solicitors, Chesterfield (brmlaw.co.uk)
Amy Hallam, Head of Employment 0114 3496989 or email amy.hallam@brmlaw.co.uk
Ellie Leatherday, Associate 01246 564002 or email ellie.leatherday@brmlaw.co.uk
Jade Taylor, Trainee Solicitor 01246 564 058 or email jade.taylor@brmlaw.co.uk
