AI could lead to more job cuts at BT, says chief executive

The chief executive of BT has said that advances in artificial intelligence could presage deeper jobs cuts at the FTSE 100 telecoms company, which has already outlined plans to shed up to 55,000 workers.Two years ago, the company said that between 40,000 and 55,000 jobs would be axed as it set out to become a “leaner” business by the end of the decade.However, in a weekend interview, its chief executive, Allison Kirkby, said the plan, which includes stripping out £3bn of costs, “did not reflect the full potential of AI”.“Depending on what we learn from AI … there may be an opportunity for BT to be even smaller by the end of the decade,” Kirkby said in an interview with the Financial Times.BT, which is the biggest broadband provider in the country, laid out plans in 2023 to cut the size of its workforce, including contractors, by 2030

Policymakers who think AI can help rescue flagging UK economy should take heed | Heather Stewart

From helping consultants diagnose cancer, to aiding teachers in drawing up lesson plans – and flooding social media with derivative slop – generative artificial intelligence is being adopted across the economy at breakneck speed.Yet a growing number of voices are starting to ask how much of an asset the technology can be to the UK’s sluggish economy. Not least because there is no escaping a persistent flaw: large language models (LLMs) remain prone to casually making things up.It’s a phenomenon known as “hallucination”. In a recent blogpost, the barrister Tahir Khan cited three cases in which lawyers had used large language models to formulate legal filings or arguments – only to find they slipped in fictitious supreme court cases, and made up regulations, or nonexistent laws

‘We’re being attacked all the time’: how UK banks stop hackers

It is every bank boss’s worst nightmare: a panicked phone call informs them a cyber-attack has crippled the IT system, rapidly unleashing chaos across the entire UK financial industry.As household names in other industries, including Marks & Spencer, grapple with the fallout from such hacks, banking executives will be acutely aware that, for them, the stakes are even higher.Within hours of a successful bank hack, millions of direct debits could fail, leaving rents, mortgages and wages unpaid. Online banking may be blocked, cash machine withdrawals denied, and commuters left in limbo as buses and petrol stations reject payments. News of the attack could spark panic, leading to a run on rival lenders, as customers pull money from their accounts amid fear the disruption could spread

Reeves braced for OBR forecasts to blow £20bn hole in tax and spending plans

Rachel Reeves is braced for revised forecasts by the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) to blow a £20bn hole in her tax and spending plans before the autumn budget.Even without changing the totals the chancellor set out in her spending review on Wednesday, a weaker forecast from the the Treasury’s independent watchdog could force her to find significantly more money at the budget to meet her “non-negotiable” fiscal rules.Reeves has said repeatedly that flexing her fiscal rules – designed to provide certainty over UK public finances – is not an option even if the economic outlook deteriorates.At her spring statement, she left herself on course to meet those rules with less than £10bn of headroom to spare, on a total budget for day-to-day spending of more than £1.3tn

Vodafone terminates contracts of 12 franchisees who joined £120m lawsuit

Vodafone has terminated the contracts of 12 franchisees who have continued running the brand’s high street stores while also being part of a £120m high court claim against the telecoms group.The legal case was launched in December, when 62 franchisees claimed Vodafone had “unjustly enriched” itself at the expense of scores of vulnerable small business owners by slashing commissions to franchisees operating the mobile phone company’s retail outlets.A dozen of the claimants had remained in the franchise programme even though they had joined 50 former colleagues in pursuing the legal case. Some of the 62 said they had had suicidal thoughts because of the pressure exerted by the telecoms group – while many claimed the company’s actions made them fear they would lose their livelihoods, homes or life savings after running up personal debts of more than £100,000.Vodafone, which says the legal claim is worth £85

Letting banks loose is back on the agenda as UK politicians chase growth at any cost

As the old ways of turning a profit become more difficult – from assembling cars to selling soap powder – politicians of all stripes want the City to inject some dynamism into the economy.From Labour to Reform, the siren call of London’s financial district is strong. If only, they ask, the wheels of the banking industry could be cranked to spin faster, surely much more money could be generated and we would all be rich.While Rachel Reeves boasted of the huge benefit to economic growth from public investments in rail and renewable energy as central pillars of the government’s spending review, in truth it is not enough to propel the economy forward.To generate the kind of income that will pay for the next 30 years of an ageing society, plans to link Manchester and Liverpool by a marginally faster and more reliable train, though good in itself, is not the answer