Labour has unveiled a major artificial intelligence policy ahead of Election 2026, promising a new Office of AI, an online safety regulator, protections for artists and creators, and tougher rules for multinational data centres.
Labour leader Chris Hipkins says artificial intelligence has the potential to transform healthcare, education, businesses and public services, but New Zealand cannot simply allow international technology companies to determine how that transformation happens.
The party’s AI Action Plan seeks to accelerate the benefits of the technology while establishing stronger safeguards around privacy, employment, copyright, online harm and human accountability.
A NEW OFFICE OF AI
At the centre of Labour’s plan is the establishment of an Office of AI to coordinate artificial intelligence policy across government.
The proposal recognises that AI is no longer confined to the technology sector.
It is increasingly being used in healthcare, education, workplaces, government agencies, professional services and business, while automated systems are playing a growing role in how information is created and decisions are made.
Labour says New Zealand needs a coordinated approach rather than individual government departments developing AI policies in isolation.
That could become particularly important as public agencies increasingly consider AI for administrative work and service delivery involving potentially sensitive information.
HUMANS MUST REMAIN ACCOUNTABLE
Labour science, technology and innovation spokesperson Reuben Davidson says the party wants clear human accountability where AI contributes to decisions affecting people’s lives.
The policy places privacy, safety and individual rights alongside the economic opportunities presented by the technology.
Labour identifies job displacement, harmful online content, energy demand from data centres and a lack of accountability for automated decisions among the risks requiring government attention.
That creates an important principle for the public sector: using AI should not mean outsourcing responsibility to an algorithm.
CREATORS TO GET COPYRIGHT PROTECTION
Artists, journalists, musicians, writers, photographers and other creative workers are also directly in Labour’s sights.
The party is promising to develop a copyright framework giving creators greater control over their work and ensuring they are paid when appropriate.
The issue has become increasingly contentious internationally as generative AI systems are trained on enormous quantities of text, images, music and other material.
For Māori, the debate potentially extends beyond conventional copyright.
The growth of generative AI raises significant questions about the treatment of mātauranga Māori, te reo Māori, whakapapa, cultural material and taonga, particularly when information can be absorbed into international AI systems and reproduced at enormous scale.
Labour’s announcement establishes a copyright direction, although the release does not provide detailed rules specifically governing Māori data sovereignty or the protection of mātauranga Māori.
Those details would therefore remain an important question in developing any future framework.
BIG DATA CENTRES MUST PAY THEIR WAY
Labour is also targeting the physical infrastructure sitting behind the AI revolution.
Large-scale AI and cloud computing data centres can require substantial amounts of electricity and expensive connections to the national grid.
Labour says major data centres should secure their own renewable electricity generation and meet their own connection costs, rather than shifting those costs onto New Zealand households.
The policy reflects the rapidly emerging collision between artificial intelligence and energy policy.
AI may exist on screens and smartphones, but the computing power behind it depends on enormous physical infrastructure.
For New Zealand, that means decisions about new data centres can also become decisions about electricity generation, transmission investment, water, land use and who ultimately pays.
AI COMES TO THE CLASSROOM
Education would receive its own dedicated AI capability.
Labour proposes establishing an AI in Education team to support schools, teachers and students as the technology becomes increasingly embedded in learning.
Schools are already grappling with questions ranging from students using generative AI for assignments to teachers using the technology to prepare lessons and reduce administrative workloads.
There are also deeper questions around digital literacy.
Knowing how to operate an AI system is increasingly only part of the challenge. Rangatahi will also need to understand when AI can be trusted, how to identify fabricated information, how personal information is used and why human judgement remains important.
ONLINE SAFETY REGULATOR
Labour also plans to establish an online safety regulator within the Department of Internal Affairs.
The party has identified harmful content as one of the risks requiring stronger oversight as increasingly powerful generative systems make it easier to produce convincing fake images, video, audio and written material.
That issue takes on additional significance during elections, where synthetic media and AI-generated misinformation can potentially be created and distributed at speed.
The policy announcement does not yet provide all the operational details around the proposed regulator’s powers, enforcement mechanisms or relationship with existing agencies.
Those details will ultimately determine how significant the new regulator would be.
SMALL BUSINESSES TO GET AI SUPPORT
Labour does not want AI regulation to become a barrier preventing smaller New Zealand businesses from benefiting from the technology.
Its plan includes assistance for small businesses and community organisations to safely adopt AI.
AI tools potentially allow smaller operators to automate administration, analyse information, improve customer service and perform tasks that previously required significantly more staff time.
Labour’s wider economic programme has already identified technology adoption as one of the areas it believes can lift productivity, particularly for small and innovative businesses.
For Māori businesses, iwi organisations and kaupapa Māori providers, access could be particularly important if AI becomes a major productivity tool across the economy.
But access will need to sit alongside questions about control of Māori data, cultural safety and whether the technology understands the communities it is being deployed to serve.
WHAT HAPPENS TO WORKERS?
Perhaps the biggest economic question surrounding artificial intelligence is what happens to jobs.
Labour says it would work with businesses and unions to ensure productivity improvements generated by AI are reflected in workers’ wages and employment conditions.
That signals Labour does not see the AI debate simply as a contest between innovation and regulation.
Its argument is that if technology allows businesses to produce more with less time and fewer resources, workers should share in those productivity gains.
The harder question will be what happens where AI does not simply make an employee more productive but replaces part or all of their job.
Labour’s announcement acknowledges job losses as a risk, although the release does not yet set out a detailed worker-transition or income-support programme specifically for people displaced by AI.
AI COULD ALSO FREE UP DOCTORS
Healthcare is one area where Labour sees immediate potential.
The party has previously proposed expanding the use of AI and digital tools such as medical scribes, which can turn patient conversations into clinical notes with consent.
Labour has estimated that wider use of AI scribes and digital tools could potentially free up the equivalent of around 1.5 million additional GP appointments annually, although that figure is a Labour policy estimate rather than an independently established outcome.
The proposition is not that AI replaces doctors.
It is that technology handles more paperwork so clinicians can spend more time treating patients.
THE AI ELECTION HAS ARRIVED
Artificial intelligence is rapidly becoming much more than a technology policy issue.
It is now an economic, employment, education, copyright, energy, privacy and democratic issue.
For Māori, another layer sits over all of those debates.
Who owns Māori data?
Who decides whether mātauranga Māori can be used to train an AI system?
How should te reo Māori be protected from inaccurate or culturally inappropriate machine-generated content?
And when government agencies use algorithms to make or support decisions affecting whānau Māori, who is ultimately accountable?
Labour’s AI Action Plan begins answering some of the broader questions through an Office of AI, online safety regulation, creator protections, education support and human accountability.
But the detailed rules — particularly around Māori data and mātauranga — will matter just as much as the headline promises.
AI is coming whether governments are ready or not. Election 2026 is increasingly becoming a contest over who writes the rules, who receives the benefits and who carries the risks.
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