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How AI is breaking the British state

https://www.economist.com/leaders/2026/08/06/how-ai-is-breaking-the-british-state
18•tchalla•2h ago

Comments

decimalenough•36m ago
https://archive.is/IDptA
decimalenough•33m ago
> One step is to stop creating entitlements that are ripe for AI-fuelled claims. Britain’s Employment Rights Act and Renters’ Rights Act open avenues of legal challenge for workers and tenants. Not only are they misguided, but ministers put little thought into how they would burden the courts.

Is the Economist seriously suggesting we should roll back workers and renters rights because AI makes it too easy for the average Joe to actually get those rights?

> Rather than just handling locals’ objections, a new Ai-driven planning system could decide for itself whether a housing development meets a zoning code. Rather than processing benefits claims, it could devise personalised welfare interventions.

And this sounds like it's going to work just grrrreat.

mhh__•24m ago
> Is the Economist seriously suggesting we should roll back workers and renters rights because AI makes it too easy for the average Joe to actually get those rights?

Yes, both of these pieces of legislation are extremely badly designed feel-good nonsense, which I personally hope will be shown to be so by an avalanche of claims automated by AI.

The employment rights legislation we have at the moment literally abolishes the market for labour - the final decision as to if your salary is "fair" is made by a judge.

rcxdude•5m ago
>The employment rights legislation we have at the moment literally abolishes the market for labour - the final decision as to if your salary is "fair" is made by a judge.

Can you explain this? I can't find anything on this from a quick google. Employment rights act seems to say very little about salary beyond the minimum wage.

pydry•4m ago
Scrooge would probably agree wholeheartedly.

The reality is that curtailment of abusive zero hours contracts provided by the employment rights legislation was direly needed and renters desperately needed protection against landlords who would habitually jack up rents and kick you out.

These are probably the only two good bits of legislation done in the last few years.

wmf•23m ago
A lot of "rights" were created with the assumption that they would be used sparingly and would never have been enacted if everyone was going to use them. You just don't have a working civilization if everyone is collecting disability, renters don't pay rent, and nothing can be built.
pessimizer•18m ago
There's neither a right nor a "right" for everyone to collect disability, to not pay rent, and to stop anyone from building.

The British state is being flooded with requests for things that people are actually entitled to, but enough administrative hurdles were intentionally placed in the way of to make sure that no one would get.

unethical_ban•3m ago
The problem then doesn't have to do with AI specifically, it requires human intervention and vetting. If the problem is "someone submitted an AI-written request that got rubberstamped", the problem is the stamp, not the AI.

Interesting, your observation on societal structures changing is very close to mine regarding laws: A lot of "laws" were created with the assumption that they would be applied as warranted by circumstances, and I think universal AI surveillance and perfect enforcement of laws will be a huge problem in the coming age.

crooked-v•17m ago
I think of the legal system in the US. It's easy to find statements about how the entire legal system would collapse if people stopped taking plea bargains because nothing is actually funded or operated in a way that actually guarantees the right to trial in any practical way.
wmf•13m ago
I wonder if the system would actually collapse or people would just sit in jail for 10 years.
mitxela•4m ago
Yes the economist is arguing that. Most of the rights of this sort were granted under the assumption that most people eligible for the rights would not be able to actually get them. If they can get them, that will be extremely inconvenient for politicians who will have to deal with a large deficit, by either cutting back rights or raising taxes on the wealthy, both of which are career suicide for a politician.
delichon•25m ago
I have great confidence in the capacity of the British state to ignore any possible volume of petitions for the redress of grievances, and to carry on.
mhh__•24m ago
> British state to ignore any possible volume of petitions

Do you live under a rock?

pessimizer•22m ago
> Yet it threatens to become a tragedy of the commons. If the state is overwhelmed and cannot function, everyone loses. When 20th-century governments created broad rights, they had the noble ideal of making citizenship meaningful. The public would be heard in consultations, get information under transparency laws and win redress for maladministration from a panoply of ombudsmen, tribunals, commissioners and judges. But these analogue systems assumed that few people would have the time or temperament to pursue their rights to the bitter end; and that of those who did, few would have the money to pay for a lawyer.

The Economist is angry because current processes were only supposed to supply the appearance of justice, but wear down anyone who wasn't a full time employee working on someone else's behalf.

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How AI is breaking the British state

https://www.economist.com/leaders/2026/08/06/how-ai-is-breaking-the-british-state
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