Sinéad Gibney (Dublin Rathdown, Social Democrats)
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228. To ask the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform if his Department has taken advice in respect of the use of artificial intelligence, AI, within the Department; if any section of his Department currently makes use of AI; the purposes it is utilised for and costs associated with same; and if he has consulted with any consultancy firms in respect of the use of AI. [4809/25]

Jack Chambers (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
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In relation to advice on the use of AI, my Department has regard to relevant guidance published by the National Cyber Security Centre, the seven requirements for ethical AI that have been developed by the European Commission’s High Level Expert Group on AI in their Ethics Guidelines for Trustworthy AI and the Interim Guidelines for the Use of AI in the Public Service. These Interim Guidelines, which were published by my own Department, underscore the Government’s commitment to promoting the adoption of trustworthy AI in the Public Service and set out high level principles to support this (the interim Guidelines are available at: www.gov.ie/en/publication/2127d-interim-guidelines-for-use-of-ai/

The Deputy may also wish to be aware that reflecting on the rapid pace of change in the adoption of AI tools, the coming into force of the EU AI Act and the refresh of the National AI Strategy by the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment in November 2024, my Department is now finalising more advanced, practice-orientated Guidelines for the Responsible Use of AI in the Public Service, including Generative AI.

To support its work on the aforementioned Guidelines, my Department has engaged the services of EY at a total cost of €48,954 (including VAT).

During 2024, the Department undertook some research to explore potential uses of AI, particularly Large Language Models, and their ability to summarise research, utilising a closed repository of existing publications. This work took the form of a limited proof of concept, developed with IBM. No costs were incurred in this regard.

As part of work to support the Better Public Services and related Life Events programmes, the Office of the Government Chief Information Officer (OGCIO), which is a Division of the Department, is developing the building blocks that make up Government as a Platform and one of those building blocks is AI oriented. In addition, in advance of any significant investment in the development of AI, the OGCIO undertook some research and development in 2024 of GenAI technology that could be made available to the Public Service. This was focussed on exploring the potential of a chatbot AI agent for people to access government information already in the public domain. There was expenditure of €120,000 (including VAT) on AI in these contexts.