The new Labour government have reportedly cut £1.3 billion worth of funding to the United Kingdom’s technology and Artificial Intelligence (AI) sectors.
This includes a pledge of £800 million to the University of Edinburgh for building an “exascale” supercomputer and an additional £500 million for AI research.
The pledge was made by the previous Conservative Government to the University last October, and since then, the University of Edinburgh has spent £31 million on building housing for the supercomputer.
When the project was initially announced, a spokesperson for the Conservative Government said the funding would increase the UK’s capacity for research, allowing a greater understanding of “climate change” and even discover “new drugs and maximise potential in AI“.
They added: “The investment will mean new high-skilled jobs for Edinburgh.”
Sir Peter Mathieson, the University of Edinburgh’s Principal and Vice-Chancellor, said the exascale computer would have established Edinburgh as the “data capitol of Europe.”
The Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) has since stated that despite its promise of funding, the government did not allocate any funding to the initiative in its budget.
A spokesperson for the DSIT said:
“The government is taking difficult and necessary spending decisions across all departments in the face of billions of pounds of unfunded commitments. This is essential to restore economic stability and deliver our national mission for growth.”
Sir Peter Mathieson is reportedly seeking a meeting with the science secretary.
TechUK, a trade body, has speculated that this decision will negatively impact UK opportunities and has urged the government to make “new proposals quickly.”
Meanwhile, former leader of the SNP, Angus Robertson, has called the Labour government’s decision “absolutely shocking, short sighted and damaging to Edinburgh and Scotland’s economy, education and tech sector.”
“File:Old College, University of Edinburgh (24923171570).jpg” by LWYang from USA is licensed under CC BY 2.0.