The plan says AI could improve health, disability, aged care, education and employment, and help create jobs.Photograph: ilkercelik/Getty ImagesView image in fullscreenThe plan says AI could improve health, disability, aged care, education and employment, and help create jobs.Photograph: ilkercelik/Getty ImagesLabor rejects standalone AI legislation with plan that offers to help ‘unlock’ public and private dataRoadmap focuses on technology’s ‘economic benefits’ and says existing laws will cover the fast-growing new technologyFollow our Australia news live blog for latest updatesGet ourbreaking news email,free appordaily news podcastThe Albanese government has decided against legislation to manage artificial intelligence, with a new national roadmap emphasising Labor’s focus on the technology’s economic benefits and plans to “unlock” vast datasets held by private companies and the public service to help train AI models.Supporting and reskilling workers affected by AI in their jobs, boosting investment in datacentres, and sharing the productivity benefits across the economy are key components of the Labor government’s National AI Plan, launched on Tuesday.The document also warned of vast water and power resources being sucked up by datacentres, AI-facilitated abuse targeting women, and unanswered questions about copyright protections for artists, writers and journalists at risk of having their content hoovered up by large language models.Sign up: AU Breaking News emailBut the government has rejected setting up a stand-alone AI act of parliament – an approachpushed by former minister Ed Husic– saying existing legislation will cover the fast-growing new technology.“This plan is focused on capturing the economic opportunities of AI, sharing the benefits broadly, and keeping Australians safe as technology evolves,” said Tim Ayres, minister for industry and science.Ayres’ AI plan said the government wanted to “harness AI technologies to create a fairer, stronger Australia where every person benefits from this technological change”, saying it could improve health, disability, aged care, education and employment, and help create jobs.The plan is supported by a $30m commitment to set up an AI Safety Institute next year, which will advise the government on the technology, including whether new laws are needed in future.Government using machine learning to help create draft plans for NDIS participants, documents revealRead moreAyres said the government would measure “success” by “how widely the benefits of AI are shared, how inequalities are reduced” and how workers were supported.As unions voice alarm at AI replacing human employees, the minister said technology “should enable workers’ talents, not replace them”, and he committed to consultation with unions and business on workplace uptake.The document spruiked Labor’s desire for Australia to be a top destination for investment, noting local excellence in datacentres, academic research and AI jobs.Ayreshad signalled early in his tenurethat a stand-alone act was not in his immediate sights, amidmuch debate about how the government should respond to the risks and benefitsof AI, and calls from businessto support the productivity-boosting technology.“The government is monitoring the development and deployment of AI and will respond to challenges as they arise, and as our understanding of the strengths and limitations of AI evolves,” the plan said.Laborearlier rejected calls from the business communityand Productivity Commission to supporta text and data mining exemption for AI companiesto help train their computer models on copyright material such as news reporting, books and film. The new AI plan says the government is still keen to help “unlock high value datasets for pilot AI use cases, from both public and private sources” to help train those models.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionAustralian government could explore using AI for cabinet submissions despite security concernsRead moreGovernment sources said those plans were still in early development, and didn’t rule out new licensing schemes or other compensation. The plan suggests “non-sensitive” public datasets from the government, such as the Bureau of Statistics, could be opened up to AI companies.“AI models are only as good as the data they are trained on. Australia has high-quality and comprehensive data sets that could support AI innovations that create value for the AI sector, can deliver public goods, and that better reflect the Australian context,” the plan said.“Both government and the private sector hold high value data sets which can support a globally competitive Australian AI sector.”The plan also noted the need to expand new renewable energy and efficient cooling technologies for systems, noting datacentres consumed about four terawatt hours of power in 2024 – 2% of the grid-supplied power – with expectations this could triple by 2030.Datacentres, which can consume tens of millions of litres of water, would need to develop new technology to cool their projects and reduce their water usage, the plan said.Explore more on these topicsAustralian politicsLabor partyArtificial intelligence (AI)newsShareReuse this content