UK tax authority HMRC deploys Microsoft Copilot to 28,000 staff after trial showed 26-minute daily time savings

Hacker News · April 27, 2026

AI Summary

•HMRC rolled out approximately 28,000 Microsoft Copilot licenses to staff and plans to enable agentic-style features (AI tools that can autonomously perform tasks). Chief AI officer James Mitton stated the goal is to make HMRC 'the most AI-enabled tax authority on the planet.'
•A June 2025 trial across 20,000 civil servants in a dozen departments found participants reported an average time saving of 26 minutes a day, with over 70 percent saying it reduced time spent searching for information and doing mundane tasks, and 82 percent saying they would not want to work without it.
•The trial report flagged 'limitations… when dealing with complex, nuanced, or data-heavy aspects of work' and raised concerns about 'security and the handling of sensitive data,' yet HMRC is proceeding to push the tool into 'Official Sensitive' workflows where access controls have historically been inconsistent.

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