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Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favorite stories in this weekly newsletter.

The writer is the prime minister of the UK

Artificial intelligence is the defining opportunity of our generation. This is not the technology of the future. Here it is, materially changing life. It prevents disease in our NHS. It creates exciting new companies in our economy. It pushes the boundaries of scientific discovery in our universities. And this is turbocharging the government’s plan to transform the country.

Take NHS waiting times. We’ll use AI to cut through this by filling appointments patients can no longer make and easily rescheduling. Or send your children to school. We will expand the opportunities for teachers to use AI to personalize lessons specifically for your child’s needs. The possibilities are endless. AI can support small businesses in their record keeping. It is easier to see the holes. This will help speed up the planning of applications to get Britain’s construction going again. It continues. In the coming years, almost any aspect of our society will remain untouched.

Britain should be excited about this. For one, it offers the plausible prospect of a long-desired productivity boost in the public sector. Nurses, social workers, teachers, police officers – for millions of frontline workers, AI can provide the precious gift of time. This means they can refocus on the caring and connection aspects of their work that are often buried under bureaucracy. That’s the strange irony of AI in the public sector. This provides an opportunity to make services more human.

Equally, as the third largest AI market in the world, Britain is well placed to take advantage of growth opportunities. Many blue-chip AI companies are already calling Britain home. Our universities are brimming with scientific talent. We have a thriving tech ecosystem with some of the best entrepreneurs on the planet. our AI the safety infrastructure is truly world leading. And our values ​​of democracy, open commerce and the rule of law are well suited to this test. Our values ​​are absolutely critical for the free exchange of ideas needed to truly maximize the potential of AI.

However, we cannot sit back and wait for the competition to be over. The global race for AI leadership is accelerating and accelerating. Some countries will make AI breakthroughs and export them to the world. The rest will be left to buy the improvements and import them. I don’t believe government should be passive or neutral in this – it is the industry’s bread and butter Privacy policy. AI is the biggest force of change in the world today. I am determined to use it to usher in a golden age of public service reform. And I am determined that the UK will be the best place to start and scale an AI business. I know that development in this area cannot be led by the state. But it is the government’s absolute job to ensure that the right conditions are in place.

So, within days of our election, I commissioned venture capitalist Matt Clifford to create a plan for harnessing the limitless potential of AI. Today, we are rolling out that plan and expecting results.

We will create new AI growth zones and breathe new life into former industrial sites across the country. We will increase computing in the public sector – the engine of AI power – by a factor of at least 20. We will establish a gold standard data access regime, with a National Data Library, a a clear and reliable copyright regime, and a renewed determination to unlock the innovation potential of NHS data. And we will bulldoze through the ridiculous blockages in our planning system that are stopping billions from investing in AI-powered data centers and grid connections.

Make no mistake – these reforms are already beginning to bear fruit. On Monday alone, Vantage Data Centers confirmed that it will invest more than £12bn in new data centers across the country, including the construction of one of Europe’s largest data centers in Wales. That should create 11,500 jobs in AI and construction. And this is a sign of things to come.

Because Britain shouldn’t just be excited about AI – it should be confident. We don’t need to walk down a US or an EU path to AI regulation – we can go our own way, taking a different British approach to testing AI long before we regulate , so that everything we do can be balanced and based on science. And with that, an offer to investors of the stability, pragmatism and good sense they have come to expect from British democratic values.

Simply put, that’s our message to anyone working on the AI ​​frontier: look at Britain. Our ambition is to be the best state partner for you anywhere in the world. We see the future, we run towards it and we support our founders. Because we know that AI has arrived as the ultimate force for change and transformation of the country.