PublicTechnology

Artificial intelligence technologies, and the datacentres that underpin them, offer the opportunity to revitalise areas most impacted by the loss of heavy industry during the past 50 years, according to a Labour MP representing a seat in Scotland’s industrial heartland.

Integrating artificial intelligence into the NHS represents a “significant challenge” for decision makers, a government-owned innovation agency has said. InnoScot Health, which was created and is owned by the Scottish Govermment and NHS bodies, has said there is “huge promise” in the technology but there must be a balancing of these opportunities with the need for good governance and building public trust.

Nearly half a million Lloyds Banking Group customers were impacted by a data glitch which meant app users could view others’ transactions, the company’s senior leaders have advised parliament. In a letter sent to the House of Common’s Treasury Committee, leaders from the bank confirmed 447,936 people were affected on the morning of 12 March, since when the company has been working with privacy and financial regulators on investigating the issue.

The head of the Scottish Government has insisted that freedom of information requests are “handled with the highest standards of impartiality and integrity” after the national data watchdog said it could no longer trust ministers with sensitive info relating to ongoing ethics probes. Scottish information commissioner David Hamilton recently said that ministers had failed to publicly release information on legal advice the government had received concerning a decision made by his office in 2024.

Artificial intelligence is entering courtrooms around the world. The technology promises faster documentation, quicker legal research and more efficient case management. But when AI arrives in the justice system, the question should not simply be how much productivity it can deliver, but whether it strengthens the legitimacy of the system itself. Unlike most enterprise environments, courts operate in a domain where the cost of error is not operational or financial, it is human.

An “uneven” data maturity landscape is limiting the Scottish public sector’s ability to adopt new technologies, according to a senior minister. Speaking at the recent Public Sector Data & AI Summit today hosted by PublicTechnology sister publication Holyrood, Scottish Government public finance minister Ivan McKee said: “If we’re to unlock the long-term potential, we must confront some of the long-term issues and common challenges – issues that will be familiar to many in the room.

Scotland’s information commissioner has said he can “no longer trust” the Scottish Government to handle information relating to investigations probing the ethics of former senior ministers. Commissioner David Hamilton said that, following a letter from Scottish Government permanent secretary Joe Griffin, it had become clear that ministers had failed to release legal advice the government had received in complying with a decision he had made in 2024.

Last month, during the second ever Chartered Week, more than 40 professional bodies representing over 1.5 million professionals wrote to government with a simple message: if the UK wants to rebuild trust in public services and deliver reliable digital systems, it must take professional standards seriously.

Facial recognition technology “should have no place” in Scotland, a human rights charity has said as Police Scotland considers its adoption. Amnesty International has warned that implementing the technology would show an “alarming disregard for fundamental human rights”. No final decision has been taken by the force on using the technology, but it is exploring the idea.

🗓️ 24 March 2026 🖥️ Free online webinar ⏱️ 10:30 – 11:30 AM (GMT) ver the past five years, public sector organisations have invested heavily in digital transformation, accelerated by the pandemic and the rapid emergence of AI. Yet despite these efforts, citizen experience scores have remained largely flat. As demand continues to grow and cost pressures increase, the gap between ambition and delivery suggests that investment alone is not translating into better citizen experiences.