Increasingly algorithms are being used to automate decision-making in the public sector. Sometimes they are used to support humans to make final decisions, sometimes decision-making is entirely automated.
These systems can bring benefits, but they also come with risks so it’s important that these systems are used in an appropriate way.
We believe that public engagement, and accountability to the public, will be important parts of:
- ensuring that automated decision-making systems are used appropriately; and
- ensuring that the public can have confidence and trust that this is the case.
What are we doing about this?
We are working on a new project in collaboration in the Greater Manchester Combined Authority to develop a set of principles that can help embed strong public engagement and accountability around the use of automated decision-making systems in the public sector. We hope this will both:
- support the practice of those within the public sector; and
- provide a resource that those outside the public sector can use to ensure appropriate standards of public engagement and accountability.
How can you get involved?
We will be carrying out workshops and interviews to understand the needs of those who will be using the resource. We will then co-design a set of principles with these participants, focussing on creating a resource that works for people working both inside and outside the public sector.
In addition to this, we will hold an online session and invite speakers to have discussions and conversations about existing good practice and resources we can learn from to inform this project.
We would like to hear from:
- people who are working on public engagement, automated decision-making and the intersection between these two topics in the public sector,
- people working in the third sector who are interested in how public engagement is used to ensure automated decision-making systems are used appropriately, and
- anyone who can help us learn more about the use of public engagement to ensure automatic decision-making is being used appropriately.
We’ll be announcing workshop dates shortly, but if you’d like to take part in an interview or just want to find out more information, feel free to email our team.