The UK Government, backed by a $1m Meta grant to the Alan Turing Institute, is launching a 12-month Open-Source AI Fellowship to bring top AI engineers into government.
These AI engineers will work under the fellowship to build open-source AI tools that improve public services, boost productivity, and support national security.
These tools could be used for high-security use cases across the public sector, such as language translation in a national security context, and making use of construction planning data to speed up the approvals process and get more homes built.
They could also help expand “Humphrey”, a bundle of AI tools that help civil servants more effectively deliver on the requests of ministers, taking away the admin burdens involved in summarising documents, taking notes and summarising consultation responses.
How AI engineers will take action across the UK
AI engineers will be focused on using open-source AI models, which could reduce costs to the taxpayer when using AI widely, and help unlock up to £45bn in productivity gains across the public sector.
This follows the Prime Minister setting out that he is “determined to seize” the opportunity of AI to transform the state, making clear that no one in government should be doing something that AI can do better and cheaper.
Technology Secretary Peter Kyle said: “This Fellowship is the best of AI in action – open, practical, and built for the public good. It’s about delivery, not just ideas – creating real tools that help government work better for people.
“AI experts will help scale that kind of impact across government, and develop sovereign capabilities where the UK must lead, like national security and critical infrastructure.”
Caddy: AI assistant programmes to help in the workplace
The fellowship for AI experts comes alongside the news that ‘Caddy’, an AI assistant that helps call centre workers, has been open-sourced, meaning call centres across the world could benefit from the tech.
Having been tested in Citizens’ Advice to date, who built the technology in partnership with the government, it is also now for the first time being used by central government, with a Cabinet Office team using it to quickly access expert guidance on grant decisions, improving speed, consistency, and value for money.
Early tests across 1,000 calls demonstrated that it could halve response times. The results also showed that 80% of Caddy-generated responses were ready to use with no revisions, and advisors using Caddy were twice as confident in providing accurate answers.
The AI Knowledge Hub: Helping teams refine their tech use
The government is also launching the next phase of the AI Knowledge Hub – a growing platform that shares real examples, tools, and tips to help teams use AI in the right way.
The Hub is designed to help departments learn from each other, avoid duplication, and move from small pilots to real results.
As part of its next phase, new features will be added, including a Prompt Library to help teams use AI to boost everyday productivity and deliver faster, better services.
AI experts can now register their interest in the fellowship
AI engineers can find more details and register their interest ahead of applications going live next week.
The fellowships will begin in January 2026 and will last for 12 months, during which all use cases will be developed, announced, and open-sourced for wider public use.
Joel Kaplan, Chief Global Affairs Officer at Meta, concluded: “Open-source AI models are helping researchers and developers make major scientific and medical breakthroughs, and they have the potential to transform the delivery of public services too.
“This partnership with the Alan Turing Institute will help the government access some of the best AI engineers and the technology they need to solve big challenges – and to do it openly and in the public interest.”