Anthony Albanese is urging \u201cfrontier AI investment\u201d to come to Australia as he unveiled the government\u2019s sweeping plan for the burgeoning, but contentious, technology, including a new Office for AI.<\/p>\n
The Prime Minister on Wednesday said Australia, like \u201cevery country on earth\u201d, grapples with the advent of generative AI.<\/p>\n
Drawing on Australia\u2019s efforts in establishing Medicare, legislating female suffrage, and the 2025 under-16s social media ban, Mr Albanese said the government could not \u201cturn back the clock or press pause\u201d on AI.<\/p>\n
\u201cNor would we want to. That would only mean cutting ourselves off from the opportunities which are there to be seized, and leaving ourselves open to the risks created elsewhere,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n
Mr Albanese said the government\u2019s proposal, which included a national standard for AI, was not just about \u201cadopting or accommodating AI\u201d.<\/p>\n
It was also about \u201cdesigning it, making it, building the capability right here,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are serious about attracting frontier AI investment to Australia, because we want are to support and create good jobs, not replace them,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Australia also had the \u201cadvantage of geography.<\/p>\n
\u2018That means we can set the terms. We can determine AI\u2019s social license.,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n
\u201cBut, we have to do it now. We cannot revisit this issue after companies have built whatever they want, wherever they want, and try to then reopen negotiations. <\/p>\n
\u201cThis is our time to decide what AI looks like here in Australia.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mr Albanese linked Wednesday\u2019s announcement to his government\u2019s attempts to clamp down on social media.<\/p>\n
\u201cImagine the difference it would have made if these limits had been put in place when the world first grasped the risks of these (social media) platforms, when we first understood their reach, and indeed their power,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat is the opportunity and the choice that we have now with artificial intelligence.\u201d<\/p>\n
Quoting Pope Leo XIV\u2019s take-down of AI, Mr Albanese said the technology created \u201ctests of our national values and our national interests, and tests of our national resolve, co-operation and ambition\u201d. <\/p>\n
\u201cIf we act now, if we mobilise our resources and co-ordinate our efforts, if we move with the urgency that the speed of this change demands, if we build to match the scale of the opportunity that this moment presents, and if we do it the Australian way, true to our values and our standards, we can make AI work in Australia\u2019s national interests,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Following Mr Albanese\u2019s address, News Corp Australasia executive chairman Michael Miller said the Prime Minister \u201chas set out a path for Australia to lead the world in AI innovation, infrastructure and intellectual property\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cI urge the government to turn this framework into action, to move fast and deliver for the nation,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Copyright protections, data centres<\/p>\n
Mr Albanese sort to calm fears from arts and news industries about the impact of AI. <\/p>\n
\u201cNot everything produced in Australia is up for grabs. Not at all,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n
\u201cAustralian writers, musicians, artists, and journalists must retain ownership and control of their work. Our laws will spell that out plain as day.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mr Albanese said the Australia\u2019s laws made creatives\u2019 rights over their work \u201cplain as day\u201d, and that creators would be able to control the \u201cprice and value\u201d of their works.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnything less is theft. No country has got this right yet,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n
\u201cNowhere do artists or rights holders have sufficient control of their work when it comes to AI training, and that is why the best way to secure the strongest copyright protections for Australian artists is for Australia to be active and involved, to build the best possible solution for ourselves, and to preserve the creativity that is fundamental to who we are to our national identity and the journalism that is essential to our democratic society.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mr Albanese also pledged that new data centres would not increase power prices and would require them to minimise water usage.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur Australian standards will also set clear rules for large data centres, where they are built in the power and water they use,\u201d Mr Albanese said.<\/p>\n
\u201cOne of our big advantages we have more than enough room for new data centres without them competing with new housing, and we will work with every level of government to see common sense prevail.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mr Albanese likened the new AI office to government developed co-ordinated approaches to other major technological advancements, such as the advent of civil aviation in the 1920s and genetics in 1990s.<\/p>\n
The office will work closely with Industry Minister Tim Ayres and Assistant Minister Andrew Charlton, who will co-design new Australian standards for AI.<\/p>\n
Energy Minister Chris Bowen will also work with states and territories \u2013 as well as energy market bodies \u2013 while Attorney-General Michelle Rowland has been \u201cfacilitating consultation on copyright and artist protections where AI training is involved\u201d, Mr Albanese will say.<\/p>\n
\u201cTreasurer (Jim Chalmers) will have responsibility for the pivotal role of AI in our productivity agenda, the Minister for Employment (Amanda Rishworth) is engaging with employers, workers and unions on AI\u2019s role in the workplace, and the Education Minister (Jason Clare) is meeting with his counterparts \u2026 to discuss the impact of AI in schools,\u201d he will say. <\/p>\n
\u201cThis is in addition to ongoing work in everything from the design of our digital duty of care, to the risks that chatbots pose to children to the intersection of AI and skills and manufacturing, and \u2013 importantly \u2013 AI in defence and national security.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2018Reliant on the good grace of the United States\u2019<\/p>\n
The announcement comes just over six months after the government announced its AI strategy, which aimed to speed up AI adoption while maintaining safeguards. <\/p>\n
However, it comes at time of heightened tension over safe and equitable use of AI as adoption becomes more widespread.<\/p>\n
Earlier this month, a delegation of leading creative industry bodies, including in music and literature, travelled to Canberra to lobby for safeguards around the scrapping of Australian intellectual property to train generative AI models. <\/p>\n
AI companies are required to get permission to use Australian creative works in model training under existing copyright laws.<\/p>\n
Independent Senator David Pocock expressed fears at the time, however, that the government was considering a carve out for AI in return for capital to fund local data centre infrastructure \u2013 a claim the government has strenuously denied. <\/p>\n
The news industry has also raised alarm bells over content being scraped and stolen for use in AI models.<\/p>\n
Calls have also grown from across the political spectrum for a potential sovereign AI \u2013 including models and data centres \u2013 amid concerns about the power over popular models such as OpenAI and Claude wielded by Washington and Silicon Valley. <\/p>\n
Liberal frontbencher Andrew Hastie told ABC on Monday the AI revolution was \u201calready here \u2026 and we\u2019re either going to miss out and become weaker as a consequence, or we\u2019ve got to seize the opportunity and make it work in our national interest\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re not going to have our own frontier model. Anthropic and Google and Meta and OpenAI and XAI, the big AI companies in the US are already developing frontier models,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy belief is that we should have a sovereign compute down here.\u201d<\/p>\n