From 2021 to 2026, The Data Lab worked in a strategic collaboration with the Scottish Government to develop and deliver Scotland’s AI Strategy through the Scottish AI Alliance. Guided by principles from the OECD and UNICEF, the strategy set out the vision for Scotland to become a world leader in trustworthy, ethical, and inclusive AI.
The Challenge
From powering smartphones to improving healthcare and detecting fraud, AI is reshaping society and revolutionising industries.
Scotland was already punching above its weight in the world of AI through the success of our universities and businesses, and innovation-focused policy. However, a clear, shared vision was needed to realise AI’s full potential for the benefit of all in Scotland.
With five years to deliver, SAIA committed to working transparently and collaboratively, sharing knowledge across sectors and building international connections, so Scotland could play an active role in the global AI conversation.
The Solution
Scotland’s AI Strategy was developed through extensive consultation and engagement with the people of Scotland, with the vision for Scotland to become a world leader in trustworthy, ethical, and inclusive AI.
A key objective was to change how people in Scotland engaged with AI by creating opportunities for everyone to get involved – from children and business leaders to academia and vulnerable communities – helping them understand how AI related to their lives.
The Outcomes
Over five years of rapid change, accelerated by the emergence of large-scale generative models, the programme evolved from a values-led mission to one increasingly focused on adoption, scale, and economic potential—while remaining grounded in its core principles of trustworthiness, ethics, and inclusion.
The Scottish AI Alliance played a key role in facilitating conversations, building collaborations, and translating complex ideas into practical guidance, helping move AI in Scotland from a niche topic to something far more widely understood and used, all while ensuring that the human dimension was never lost from the conversation.
Key outcomes include:
- AI Summits: Three annual and four regional AI Summits between 2022 and 2025, brought together over 1,400 stakeholders from Scotland and beyond for discussions on trustworthy, ethical and inclusive AI.
- The Scottish AI Playbook: Launched in October 2024, this open and practical guide provides clear, jargon-free guidance for organisations at the early stages of their AI journey, covering strategy, procurement, and governance, and is complemented by an online practitioner community, workshops, and case studies.
- The Scottish AI Register: Launched in 2023, this minister-mandated web portal provides transparency on AI systems in the public sector. It has since been declared mandatory for the Scottish Government and its core agencies and serves as a working model of AI accountability beyond Scotland’s borders.
- Living with AI: A public AI literacy programme empowering people to engage actively and critically with AI. With a completion rate of 34% — nearly 3x the industry average — it is now hosted by 17 partner organisations and has reached over 16,000 learners. The Joseph Rowntree Foundation acknowledged it as the only public AI literacy initiative of its kind in the UK.
- Community Engagement: Workshops, surveys and People’s Panel events on AI in climate and healthcare have fed public insights directly into policy conversations.
- Exploring Children’s Rights and AI project: This three-year partnership with The Children’s Parliament and The Alan Turing Institute gave over 140 children a voice in shaping Scotland’s AI future, with resources now reaching up to 120,000 children in schools.
With the 2021 AI strategy concluding, activity will transition to support the delivery of Scotland’s new national AI Strategy. The Data Lab continues to be a key partner in delivering the new strategy launched in March 2026.