By CLAIRE ELLICOTT WHITEHALL EDITOR Published: 22:13 BST, 25 September 2025 | Updated: 22:18 BST, 25 September 2025
Artificial intelligence companies will never have to pay publishers and artists for using their work, an aide to the Technology Secretary has said.Kirsty Innes, an adviser to Liz Kendall, said that Big Tech firms will not have to compensate creatives for using their work to train their systems.Her recent appointment will alarm musicians, artists and writers who have called for a fairer deal from the tech giants who use their work.The Daily Mail is campaigning to protect Britain's creative industries from the threat of AI and Government plans to allow them to ignore copyright rules.But posting on social media, Ms Innes said: 'Whether or not you philosophically believe the big AI firms should compensate content creators, they in practice will never legally have to.' This would mean firms can use any online material, such as text, images or music, to improve their AI models – without respecting copyright laws that ensure its creators get paid.Instead, members of Britain's world-renowned £126billion creative industries would have to opt out of having their work exploited. They liken this system to letting burglars take what they want from a home – unless the owner puts a note on the door asking them not to. Artificial intelligence companies will never have to pay publishers and artists for using their work, aide to the Technology Secretary Kirsty Innes, pictured, has saidMs Innes, who previously worked at the Tony Blair Institute think-tank, has deleted the statement, which she tweeted in February, seven months before she became a ministerial adviser.In the posts, seen by the Guardian, she said: 'A lot of this has already happened and it can continue to happen outside the UK, whatever our laws say. This might be a bitter pill to swallow for some.'The paper said TBI has received donations from the Oracle tech billionaire Larry Ellison that reached $270million (£210million) last year. Oracle is a backer of the $600billion Stargate project to build AI infrastructure across the US with OpenAI and the Japanese investment firm SoftBank.Ms Innes and Ms Kendall have not commented on the reports.
