Artificial Intelligence Consortium – Terms of reference

Purpose

The Artificial Intelligence Consortium (Consortium) will provide a platform for public-private engagement to gather input from stakeholders on the capabilities, development, deployment and use of artificial intelligence (AI) in UK financial services.

The aims of the Consortium will be:

1. to identify how AI is or could be used in UK financial services, for example, by considering new capabilities, deployments and use cases as well as technical developments where relevant
2. to discuss the benefits, risks and challenges arising from the use of AI. Such benefits, risks and challenges may be with respect to financial services firms or with respect to the wider financial system
3. to inform the Bank of England’s (Bank’s) and Financial Conduct Authority’s (FCA’s) ongoing approach to addressing any identified risks and challenges, and in promoting the safe adoption of AI.

For the avoidance of doubt, the Consortium will not consider the Bank's and FCA’s own use of AI.

The Bank and FCA will use the Consortium to inform their approach to the use of AI in the financial sector. However, there will be no obligation for the Bank or the FCA to act on the discussions of the Consortium or the outputs of its workshops. The Consortium has no decision-making capacity.

Meetings

The Consortium will meet quarterly. The co-Chairs may need to vary the meeting frequency where circumstances demand it.

The Secretariat will produce a summary of discussions from meetings which will be published on the Bank’s website.

Workshops

Members of the Consortium may propose forming small working groups (workshops) to conduct in-depth and/or technical examinations of specific subjects of relevance to the Consortium (detailed in Annex 2).

The Bank and FCA do not expect to publish the outputs of the workshops but may publish summaries of Consortium discussions of the outputs. However, members of workshops would be free to publish findings from the workshops provided prior permission is sought from the Bank and FCA. This should not be considered a Bank or FCA endorsement of any such outputs.

Membership

Membership of the Consortium is at the invitation of the Bank and FCA following a selection process (detailed in Annex 1).

Members of the Consortium are expected to:

• attend physical/virtual meetings as required, including workshops (where relevant), unless otherwise agreed with the co-Chairs
• provide technical, analytical, and business perspectives and inputs to the discussions
• act in a personal capacity and to contribute to the Consortium with a view to sharing perspectives that reflect their constituency as a whole, rather than representing the views or interests of their individual organisations
• contribute actively and constructively to the Consortium’s work, including relevant workshop(s) and follow-up activities
• be responsive to communications and requests from the Secretariat and fellow Consortium members.

Membership is on an individual basis. A member who steps down cannot, therefore, automatically pass on their seat to a replacement within their organisation.

Members shall abide by their responsibilities set out in Annex 3.

Members are not considered employees or workers of the Bank or FCA and will not receive monetary compensation for membership. Views expressed by members are their own and do not represent the official position of the Bank or the FCA.

Membership will be periodically reviewed to ensure diversity of perspective and balance of expertise. The Secretariat may determine whether to fill a vacancy if a member steps down or is otherwise unable to continue their participation.

Where the above expectations are not met, or where a member otherwise does not abide by any other responsibilities set out in the Terms of reference – including those relating to conflict of interest and confidentiality – the Secretariat may, at its discretion, withdraw an individual’s membership.

Governance and responsibilities

The Consortium will be co-chaired by the Bank’s Deputy Governor for Financial Stability and the FCA’s Executive Director of Supervision, Policy and Competition (SPC). The co-Chairs may nominate a deputy. The co-Chairs and Deputy Chair will be responsible for:

• setting the strategy for the Consortium and shaping its forward agenda
• guiding and moderating the discussions in meetings
• inviting observers to attend meetings and/ or workshops, where appropriate
• considering members’ views and comments on summaries of discussions

The Bank and FCA will provide the Consortium’s Secretariat.

General enquiries can be directed to the Secretariat at AIConsortium@bankofengland.co.uk.

Observers may be invited to attend specific Consortium meetings and/or workshops if and when it is considered relevant or necessary at the discretion of the co-Chairs. Observers will not take part in setting agendas. Observers and any other non-member participants may not participate in the discussion unless invited to contribute by the co-Chairs. In all other instances, observers are expected to adhere to these terms of reference.

Annex 1. Membership Selection Process

1. The Bank will place a call for interest alongside these terms of reference, outlining the purpose, scope and function of the Consortium, and asking for individuals to apply to be a member.
2. Applicants will be asked to send in an application with a brief summary (no more than 500 words) on their background, focusing on their professional experience and relevance to the Consortium. Applicants will also be asked to suggest a topic of discussion for one of the meetings.
3. The Secretariat will review all answers and score them across pre-determined criteria. 
4. After considering all applications against the criteria, the Secretariat will invite successful candidates to join the Consortium’s membership. 
5. The Consortium is initially expected to have around 30 members.

Annex 2. Workshops

1. Once a specific topic or problem statement has been identified by a member(s) as suitable for further consideration, they should propose this to the co-Chairs as a workshop. Topics should be of relevance to the Consortium’s aims and merit deeper consideration, especially where the Consortium’s regular meetings do not afford enough time for discussing the topic in sufficient depth.
2. The co-Chairs and Secretariat will consider proposals from the membership for workshops. The member(s) may be asked to submit a formal proposal.
3. If the co-Chairs and Secretariat deem the proposal to be within scope, and feasible to carry out, it will be presented to the membership.
4. If there is agreement among the membership on creating a workshop for the given topic, the member(s) who proposed the topic will become the workshop lead. Where the proposal is from multiple members, they will all act as co-chairs of the workshop.
5. The remaining membership will then have the opportunity to join the workshop.
6. The workshop will have its own secretariat, which may include staff from workshop members’ organisations. The chair(s) of the workshop will be responsible for setting up the workshop’s Secretariat.
7. A workshop should aim to be conducted over a period of three to six months. Workshop meetings should act as check-ins, with the majority of the work conducted by members outside of workshop meetings. Members may invite subject-matter experts from their organisation to workshops, upon approval of the chair of the workshop, to contribute to workshop discussions.
8. A Member of the Consortium’s secretariat, at a minimum, will attend all meetings to ensure that workshops are effective and do not diverge from the initial scope.

Annex 3. Member Responsibilities

Members are responsible for identifying and declaring any financial or other interests that could create or be seen to create a conflict of interest as a participant of the Consortium, as soon as they arise. If a member finds that a conflict of interest becomes apparent only as the meeting progresses, the nature of the conflict should be declared as soon as practical to the co-Chairs. The co-Chairs will then decide how the conflict should be managed.

It is the responsibility of each member to ensure they understand and comply with their obligations under all applicable competition law.

• keep such information secret and confidential
• not use or exploit the information in any way except for the purposes of the Consortium as set out in these terms of reference
• not directly or indirectly disclose or make available any such confidential information in whole or in part to any person, except as expressly permitted in writing by the Bank and FCA or in accordance with these terms of reference
• not to copy, reduce to writing or otherwise record confidential information except as strictly necessary for the purposes of the Consortium as set out in these terms of reference

Neither the Bank nor the FCA nor any of their staff or representatives, including but not limited to the Consortium co-Chairs and Secretariat, are responsible for views or statements expressed by other participants.

Annex 4. Data Protection

The Bank will collect the name, work email address, job title, name of organisation, and summary of role and experience, from individuals who submit an application for Membership of the Consortium.

The Bank will also collect views, opinions and further personal data where this is shared either verbally or in writing (e.g., by using a ‘chat’ function) by individuals participating in meetings for the Consortium.

The Bank considers that itself and each member is likely to be a ‘controller’ in respect of the processing of personal data for the purposes of their participation in the Consortium.

Where the Bank processes personal data for the purposes of the Consortium, they will use and share the information with the FCA for the purpose of reviewing and assessing applications to become a member of the Consortium, to communicate with members and to advance the purposes of the Consortium as set out more fully in these Terms of reference.

The Bank will process personal data where necessary for the performance of their tasks carried out in the public interest being the establishment of a forum to facilitate dialogue around the use of AI in financial services in the UK. The Bank will share your personal data with the FCA as co-chair of the Consortium and with other members where necessary for this purpose.

To ensure that the Bank and FCA’s external engagement is transparent, the names and professional affiliations of members may be published on the Bank’s websites.

Safeguarding individuals’ personal data is important to the Bank and FCA. Members’ personal data will be stored on secure Bank servers with controlled access. The Bank is committed to information security and uses a range of layered information security measures to protect the data it holds. It will keep members’ personal data for so long as is necessary to facilitate the Consortium or otherwise in accordance with the Bank’s applicable document retention policies, which are available upon request from the Bank. You can request that we no longer use your personal data by writing to the Bank.

Further information about how the Bank processes personal data is set out in the Bank’s Privacy Notice.

Information about how the FCA processes personal data can be found in the FCA’s privacy notice.

Where the Bank uses an online meeting service provider to host meetings, then the privacy statement of that service provider will apply.

You have a number of rights under data protection laws. To contact the Bank about those rights, including making a request for the personal data the Bank holds about you, please see the Bank’s Privacy Notice above. You can also report concerns to the Information Commissioner’s Office, the regulatory authority for data protection in the UK. Contact details can be found on their website.

The Bank’s Data Protection Officer can be contacted via the details above.