20102 (2026). Hon Willow-Jean Prime to the Minister for Social Development and Employment

20102 (2026). Hon Willow-Jean Prime to the Minister for Social Development and Employment: What artificial intelligence tools, if any, do staff at the Ministry of Social Development currently use in their daily work?

Hon Louise Upston: I am advised by the Ministry of Social Development (MSD) that MSD staff have access to one generative AI system, Microsoft Copilot, as a general productivity tool, and to publicly available generative AI systems for personal use and ideation only. Staff also have access to AI in the form of various common functions of corporate software and infrastructure (e.g. search engines, grammar checking and spam filters). Other AI tools (or functionality within tools) in use by MSD but not available to all staff include: • Voice recognition used as a means of authenticating staff or clients • Audio transcription to help categorise inbound calls (not used to inform decisions about individual clients) • Predictive models to support forecasting of demand for services • An analysis support tool (MAXQDA) to assist with analysis of submissions as part of the select committee process.