Anthony Albanese traveled back in time Wednesday during his much-anticipated talk on artificial intelligence.
Seeking to take advantage of the profound changes affecting our lives, the Prime Minister told an audience at the University of Sydney that the government wanted to keep pace with AI and even “get ahead” of the technology wave.
He likened the moment to when he was hired as a Commonwealth Bank employee and was tasked with persuading customers to ditch their paper passbooks for keycards and “holes in the walls.”
The power of change brought about by AI is so great that Labor MPs have been hearing for months from worried voters, businesses and trade unions that it is past time for the government to get involved. Data center development is already disrupting local communities across the country.
Mr Albanese said he would work with premiers on new rules to carefully manage planning controls for mega-facilities and ensure they do not take up land needed for housing or dominate local energy systems. Operators will have to pay for the new water infrastructure needed to cool their facilities, and household spending cannot be allowed to rise due to a surge in demand.
Following next month’s national cabinet meeting and the creation of a new office on AI within his department, Albanese plans to push Congress to consider new legislation in early 2027.
He declared the country must be more than just a “data warehouse for AI products manufactured overseas” and need to benefit from Australian innovation. He promised new standards and faster decision-making to foster the social license that he believes AI so badly needs.
The approach is vintage Albanese. He believes that while critics have accused him of being cowardly and slow, his careful and methodical approach has brought Labor better policies.
Ahead of Mr Albanese’s speech, former Labor Minister Ed Husic, who advocated for sweeping new AI legislation before being ousted from cabinet, warned that the legal approach to AI was akin to Swiss cheese. He said Labor should not just serve up a “fancy cheeseboard” and called for a comprehensive response.
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But the reality is that Australia will not be able to direct much of the activities of global tech giants such as Anthropic, Microsoft, Google and OpenAI.
Challenges such as regulating social media, blocking hate speech and curbing images of child sexual abuse show that these companies are more powerful than most national governments and can set terms and prices for countries such as Australia.
Labor could be similarly hobbled by public concerns about widespread job losses. The potential of general-purpose technologies such as AI will permeate all aspects of modern life. Governments cannot legislate or mandate their use to realistically deal with technological advances.
But one area Mr Albanese promised “the strongest protection possible” is Australia’s copyright system. He ruled out text and data exemptions for AI owners, saying the work of writers, filmmakers, musicians and journalists is valuable and should never be added to the menu of hungry AI models.
“Anything else is theft,” he warned, appearing to take aim at companies who say Australia’s restrictions on content use could become a barrier to billions of dollars in new investment. Such a move would protect and promote Australia’s culture, creative industries and media livelihoods.
Australia has agency and sovereignty over some of the decisions needed to manage the coming wave of AI, but pretending that the government can dictate anything more is like barracking bank tellers in the online world.
