The New South Wales government permanently “retired” the role of chief data scientist late last year, prompting Professor Ian Oppermann, the architect of the state’s AI Assurance Framework, to leave the public service.
Professor Ian Oppermann, who spent much of last year refreshing the governance framework that guides the use of AI by public servants in the state, revealed the circumstances behind his departure on Friday.
“As of the end of 2023, the role of chief data scientist was retried, so I moved on to doing something else,” he told the state’s parliamentary inquiry into AI in his capacity as Industry Professor at the University of Technology Sydney.
Professor Oppermann left the role of chief data scientist abruptly in December after more than eight years and has since joined the technology advisory firm set up by former NSW minister Victor Dominello.
He had just wrapped up work on the second iteration of the AI Assurance Framework, which will form the basis for a national framework agreed to by Australia’s digital and data ministers last month.
At the time of his departure, the Department of Customer Service (DCS) said Professor Oppermann’s “work on the AI Assurance Framework will now be led by the team within Digital NSW”, without commenting on the future of the role.
On Friday, a DCS spokesperson confirmed that the role of chief data scientist had been dissolved, leaving the AI Review Committee, set up by the former Coalition government in 2021, without a chair.
The committee, a key element of the state’s AI strategy, reviews AI projects that cost $5 million or more or are funded through the Digital Restart Fund, although the decisions are not binding and cannot prevent a project from progressing.
Committee members include Microsoft’s AI technology and policy lead for Asia, Lee Hickin, and Edward Santow, a director at the Human Technology Institute and the former Human Rights Commissioner.
Professor Oppermann on Friday said that while the committee “still exists and still is established”, he is “no longer sure whether it’s operating”. He also described the expertise on the committee as having been “lost”.
“What’s been lost is having a central expert group… we had an incredible group of people who dedicated quite substantial amounts of time to dig into really, really significant and subtle issues,” he said.
“But, ultimately, what has to happen is the capability must be uplifted in all parts of government, so the philosophy we had was we will make this extraordinary technology as ordinary as possible; we will remove the need for specialisation.”
Despite Professor Oppermann’s comments, a government spokesperson said the committee “continues to meet and review the use of AI across NSW government and work on an updated AI Assurance Framework”.
NSW government chief digital and information officer Laura Christie on Monday told the inquiry that the government has reviewed the membership of the committee and is “in the process of reappointing the committee”.
Professor Oppermann also said he had “hoped the draft of the [AI] Assurance Framework would actually be officially declared version two, but then the… Cabinet process, essentially took that a little further”.
In December, Digital Government minister Jihad Dib in said the government was in the “final stages” of developing the next iteration of the AI Assurance Framework and would hopefully be released in early 2024.
“The reason I say hopefully is because we could have released it a little bit earlier, but let’s get it… absolutely 100 per cent right and the timing absolutely right, rather than [just] putting things out there,” he told the Future of AI Summit.
Update: March 11, 2024
This article has been updated to include Ms Christie’s comments to the parliamentary inquiry into AI on Monday.
