In July, technology secretary, Peter Kyle, wrote to the Institute’s chair demanding a change to focus on defence research.
“It has been a great honour to lead the UK’s national institute for data science and artificial intelligence, implementing a new strategy and overseeing significant organisational transformation,” said Innes, “with that work concluding, and a new chapter starting for the institute, now is the right time for new leadership and I am excited about what it will achieve.”
Whistleblowers complained that the management’s response to problems is “performative” – just talk, no action, nothing has changed.” In a letter to the Charity Commission they accused the institute “of misusing public funds, overseeing a ‘toxic internal culture, and failing to deliver on the charity’s mission”.
Another whistleblower also blamed the culture: “There isn’t a lot of direction and it’s a hotbed of senior academics doing what senior academics do and fighting for power, with absolutely no focus on or incentives around delivering outcomes for the public.”
The Institute was originally founded by five universities: Cambridge, Edinburgh, Oxford, UCL, and Warwick. In 2018, eight additional universities joined: Queen Mary University of London, Leeds, Manchester, Newcastle, Southampton, Birmingham, Exeter and Bristol.
The Institute employs 440 people of whom 50 are under notice of redundancy . It has a government-supplied budget of £100 million a year.
