UK £400 billion AI boost figure traced to Google report, minister says

The £400 billion figure had been used by government departments and agencies for almost two years under two governments, and ministers had the lower estimate since at least November 2025. Yet Skills England, a government agency responsible for apprenticeships, was still publishing the old figure four months later. The parliamentary answer is the first recorded evidence that the government set the two numbers side by side.

PF Global's head of economics, Jonathan Dupont, said the disparity was partially because the government's model assumes a much slower rate of AI adoption than seemed possible in 2023. He added that given slower adoption in practice, the firm's central estimate for potential achieved by 2030 is now much closer to the government's number. The government has not withdrawn the £400 billion figure or said it was wrong.

Dame Chi Onwurah, who chairs the Commons Science, Innovation and Technology Committee, said the reports highlight hype as a central barrier to digital transformation. Sumedha Deshmukh of the Ada Lovelace Institute said figures about AI often have assumptions and incentives built in, and industry often funds or shapes the research behind them. PF Global said its work for Google continued but all research was independent and all judgments and assumptions were their own.