Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I had a young constituent of mine reach out to talk to me about AI technologies and how they're changing the world, increasingly becoming the norm in industries from, you know, coffee shops to the highest levels of military. So my question is for the Minister responsible for the public Service. What policies are currently in place to govern the use of AI technology in the GNWT? Thank you.
Thank you, Member from Range Lake. Minister of Finance.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the use of artificial intelligence obviously is a new area. It certainly is one that we are looking to provide better guidance to our staff on. So what we've done thus far, we looked to what the Government of Canada's doing, we've also looked at what the Government of British Columbia doing, and that is likely to be where we'll find the most alignment that can help us move this forward a little faster. And with that, we will be able to produce our own guidelines for the use of generative artificial intelligence, which I expect that and then training associated to be ready for staff in the very near future. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And I would appreciate knowing a clear timeline on that. Are we looking at the end of term or next year or something like that because this technology's moving fast every day, and faster still, it's learning a lot. So when can we expect to see those new policies come in place? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I'm aware that this work is well underway. I don't have the timeline in front of me, but it certainly will be this government and I would say, really, not the end of the government but fairly soon. So I'll certainly happily commit to get that timeline back to the Member. It is an area where we want to ensure that people are able to use this. It can be an opportunity for efficiency, creativity. But it needs to be used responsibly, and it needs to have human oversight to make sure that we remain, you know, obviously, transparent in what we're doing. So happy to provide that date as soon as I can. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister of Finance. Final supplementary. Member from Range Lake.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, you would use AI to write your own policies but let's not do that.
Mr. Speaker, there's also AI technology you could use to better manage our energy systems, our emergency management systems, and a host of other things to improve that. Is this policy also going to cover the use of those technologies that could be procured for other public policy purposes? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. At this point, Mr. Speaker, I mean, looking at using AI technology in areas of infrastructure and actually replacing type of different infrastructure systems is beyond what I'm speaking to here. What I'm looking at here is how the public service is using AI really more in day-to-day functions. So, again, don't want to be overpromising in terms of what it is, but it's really meant to be guidance for the public service in how we use it in a public service context and not necessarily when it comes to, for example, battery systems. Certainly open to having an opportunity to look at those as well, if it would answer questions here in the House, but this is really focused on the public service who are delivering functions to public, you know, policy generation for example, not necessarily replacing infrastructure. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Minister of Finance. Oral questions. Member from Great Slave.
