The Ministry of Justice (MoJ) have published an update to its AI action plan for justice focusing on strengthening their foundations ,embedding AI across the justice system and investing in people and partners.
The updated plan, is sectioned into four priorities, includes completed actions, updated progress and goals for the second year of the plan.
Priority ones and two focuses on actions to strengthen leadership and governance, alongside embedding clear standards in ethics and transparency and improving data and digital infrastructure.
Actions supporting priority one include establishing clear strategic leadership for AI via the Justice AI Unit and the departmental chief AI officer and establishing key governance and oversight mechanisms to ensure accountable and transparent AI deployment. The Ministry of Justice has further secured strategic partnerships with leading technology providers, including Microsoft and OpenAI. Through their partnership with OpenAI, the MoJ became the first government department to roll out an enterprise version of ChatGPT.
The MoJ said their priorities moving forward focus on continuing to embed governance, ethics and assurance consistently across the system, as well as improve secure access to shared AI infrastructure and services.
Further priority two goals include evaluating AI interventions to help reduce the Crown Court backlog and support faster case progression and continue to scale Justice Transcribe, exploring its wider application across other areas of the justice system.
The MoJ’s third priority actions investing in talent pipelines through fellowships and internships, attracting specialist AI expertise into the department, whilst also strengthening staff capabilities through organisation wide learning. Moving forward, MoJ said it plans to further strengthen AI talent pipelines, strengthen sector partnerships and drive forward new initiatives to support innovation, including the opening of the AI Growth Lab.
A fourth strand of the plan focuses on collaboration through existing cross-system forums and partnerships to bring together “operational, policy, analytical, and technical insight to further strengthen existing systems and identify risk.”
“With strong foundations in place and demonstrable successes, we will continue leveraging AI safely and responsibly to address some of the longstanding challenges facing the justice system, driving better outcomes for staff and citizens” the MoJ concluded.
