TRADE UNIONS, rights groups and other civil society organisations say they have been excluded from a government summit on artificial intelligence despite the threats posed by the technology.

The summit takes place tomorrow and Thursday at Bletchley Park, the secret centre where German codes were deciphered during the second world war.

More than 100 British and international organisations, including the TUC, have signed an open letter to Prime Minister Rishi Sunak calling the summit a missed opportunity and saying that the event will be dominated by big technology companies that will profit from artificial intelligence (AI).

AI is seen as the next major advance in new technology, with life-changing effects for millions of people, but critics fear its misuse, including in surveillance, identifying individuals and making decisions on employment and dismissal.

The letter tells the PM: “Your global summit on AI safety seeks to tackle the transformational risks and benefits of AI, acknowledging that AI ‘will fundamentally alter the way we live, work, and relate to one another.’

“Yet the communities and workers most affected by AI have been marginalised by the summit. The involvement of civil society organisations that bring a diversity of expertise and perspectives has been selective and limited.

“For many millions of people in the UK and across the world, the risks and harms of AI are not distant:  they are felt in the here and now.

“This is about being fired from your job by algorithm, or unfairly profiled for a loan based on your identity or postcode.”

The letter also warns that people are being subject to “authoritarian biometric surveillance or to discredited predictive policing.”

“Small businesses and artists are being squeezed out, and innovation smothered as a handful of big-tech companies capture even more power and influence,” it says.

TUC assistant general secretary Kate Bell said: “It is hugely disappointing that unions and wider civil society have been denied proper representation at this summit.

“AI is already making life-changing decisions — like how we work, how we’re hired and who gets fired.

“But working people have yet to be given a seat at the table.”