Britain’s creative sector in ‘existential crisis’ from AI thanks to government

Ministers’ approach to the UK’s new Data (Use and Access) Act has come under fierce criticism from industry leaders and Bridget Jones director Baroness Kidron, who led a vocal challenge in the House of Lords.

Speaking exclusively to LBC News’ Steve Holden, Baroness Kidron claimed ministers have ‘given away’ the nation’s most valuable data assets, like songs, movies and graphics, to foreign tech giants in exchange for short-term investment, a move she warned could permanently undermine the UK’s national interests.

Meanwhile, the Musicians’ Union said it may already be ‘too late’ to compensate creatives whose copyrighted work has been stolen by tech companies to train their artificial intelligence models.

The process known as ‘scraping’ is widely condemned within the sector including by the likes of Elton John who referred to Technology Secretary Peter Kyle as a ‘moron’.

According to latest government figures, the UK’s creative sector is worth £124 billion and employs 2.4 million people.

But a report from 2024 by the International Confederation of Societies of Authors and Composers estimated music creators could lose a joint $10 billion (£7.4 billion) worth of income by 2028, because of the growth of generative AI.

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Industry insiders told LBC a lack of data makes it impossible to quantify the impact on the UK, but the rate at which AI is expanding represents an unprecedented challenge.

“What the government was doing, in effect, was legitimising the fact that creative work is being stolen at scale by AI companies. They're ingesting it into their LLMs (large language models), their big models from which they create new products, and they're going, oh, whoops, we stole it. Too bad, we need it,” Baroness Kidron explained.

Her amendment would have introduced an obligation for tech companies to be transparent about when they used copyrighted work, so the law could be enforced.

“Do I own my own creative output? The law says I do. International treaty agreements say I do. And the government were going, maybe yes, maybe no,” she said.

The government argues the new law is necessary to keep the UK competitive in the global AI race and is expected to produce an AI bill covering copyright issues next year. Ministers have said no changes will be made unless they ‘work for creators’ and are currently working their way through responses to an AI consultation.

But Baroness Kidron accused the government of prioritising deals with Silicon Valley over the interests of British creators and industries. She instead argues for creating a ‘vibrant licensing’ market where creators are fairly compensated for their work.

“Increasingly, what we're hearing is that this government has decided to throw its lot in with Silicon Valley, with the US administration, and they see the power of Silicon Valley as a blocker to having really a sovereign view of AI. I think that people must think about that carefully, because it's not going to be just the creative industries, it's going to come for other industries, it's going to come for publicly held data,” she warned.

The Musicians’ Union, which represents more than 36,000 in the UK, says it is not against artificial intelligence, but told LBC it wanted to work with the government to see additional protections ‘as soon as possible’.

General Secretary Naomi Pohl said: “I think this is potentially an existential threat. In the past, when there's been a new use of creative work, generally there's been a compensation mechanism. It's perfectly possible for systems to be developed that make sure that musicians and other creators are properly compensated when their works are used in this way.

“It wouldn't be difficult for the government to put additional protections in place and that's what we want to see as soon as possible. There is a fear the horse has bolted to some extent because some models have trained on creative works already.”

Chris Columbus, the film director behind the first two Harry Potter movies, said: “It's a little terrifying. There are a lot of people saying, just use AI and use it to the best of your abilities. But I think it's growing much faster than we can handle at this point.”

Violinist and Classic FM presenter Nicola Benedetti said: “I think we will adjust. I do believe artists will fight that case eloquently. But we also have a history of artists being used and abused, and it's just going to be a fight that we have to keep fighting.”

A government spokesperson said: "These suggestions are not correct - we are firmly committed to considering a range of options that help achieve our objectives.

"No decisions have been taken, but our focus will always be on enhancing the ability of rights holders to be compensated and paid fairly, while enabling access to high-quality material to train leading AI models in the UK."

LBC asked several of the major tech companies for a comment.