Minister says Irish jobs will be lost to AI but she can't say how many (yet)
Niamh Smyth, a junior minister at the Department of Enterprise, said it would be foolish not to admit that jobs will be displaced. However, she added that, in her opinion, Ireland cannot afford not to 'embrace AI'.
The government is currently establishing a regulator to enforce the
EU's new AI rules rules
, while also trying to ensure Irish businesses reap the technology's benefits, and
public services
use it to become more efficient.
Smyth said the government will also establish an 'AI Observatory' which will provide data on where jobs will be lost, how many are at risk, and how this can be mitigated.
The minister was grilled on the extent to which the government will regulate companies' use of AI at the new Oireachtas committee on AI this morning.
Sinéad Gibney of the Social Democrats said she was concerned that the government did not seem to be striking the right balance between supporting business to embrace AI and addressing the risks the technology poses, including job losses, greenhouse gas emissions and misinformation.
Outlining her priorities to the committee, Smyth had said she particularly wanted to drive AI adoption and AI literacy among small and medium businesses.
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Smyth's department is establishing a new independent AI office to provide legal guidance to businesses on how to comply with the
EU's AI Act
, with Smyth telling the committee this would provide much-needed certainty to businesses, and would be well-resourced when it's up and running in just over a year's time.
Gibney noted that the government's own AI strategy, updated last October, states that the EU AI Act will place 'few, or no, obligations on most businesses who use AI'.
She said the minister's own stated commitments were overwhelmingly focused on supporting businesses, rather than on managing the risks.
Smyth said the EU Act took a 'risk-based approach' to protecting citizens.
She said it was too early to say whether any domestic legislation to regulate the use of AI would be introduced.
Meta AI
Paul Murphy of People Before Profit questioned Smyth on recent
reporting by
The Journal
on the conditions faced by content moderators
training Meta AI at Covalen, an Irish outsourcing firm.
Workers were asked to think like paedophiles and to spend entire work days creating suicide and self-harm related 'prompts' to regulate the responses given by Meta's AI products.
Smyth said she was not familiar with the article but said the EU AI Act is intended to protect citizens, taking a 'risk-based approach'.
'The example you're giving there is a very cruel way of using workers, and it certainly wouldn't be acceptable here in Ireland,' Smyth said.
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'This is happening in Ireland,' Murphy said. 'It's an Irish firm, Covalen, outsourced from Meta.'
'I'll have to come back to you on it,' Smyth responded. 'That is certainly not acceptable in terms of that treatment of workers.'
Data centres
Murphy also raised concerns that the minister's opening statement to the committee made no mention of the climate impact of AI, given its requirement for energy-hungry data centres.
Smyth said she hoped Ireland could both embrace AI in an ethical way and meet its climate targets. She said that 'the energy question…has to be answered by the energy department'.
'There is no getting away from the fact that [data centre development] has put Ireland front and centre in being attractive to a lot of the companies who have come here,' Smyth said.
Smyth said that, given her own background in the arts, as a graduate of the National College of Art and Design, her biggest concern about AI was its potential impact on the creative industries.
'We don't want their work stolen, used or scraped. We have a balancing act to achieve here that we do allow the right environment and ecosystem for the development of innovation and ensuring that we protect our citizens and the creative industries alongside that,' she said.
She indicated Ireland's EU presidency next year provides an opportunity to showcase Ireland as a technology leader by hosting an AI summit or conference
similar to an event hosted by French President Emmanuel Macron earlier this year.
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