Downing Street deletes tweets after suggesting UK was nonetheless member of EU

Downing Street was compelled to delete a tweet and repost it after suggesting the UK was nonetheless a part of the EU.

The official No 10 Twitter account shared a thread on what Britain is doing to turn out to be a worldwide chief on the secure growth of synthetic intelligence (AI).

In one tweet, it included a graphic saying the UK is “home to twice as many AI companies as any other EU country”.

But the tweet was deleted and reposted round 45 minutes later with a brand new graphic with the wording modified to “any EU country”.

A variety of eagle-eyed Twitter customers picked up on the gaffe by Downing Street.

The UK formally left the EU in January 2020 following the 2016 Brexit referendum.

In the thread, No 10 stated: “AI can transform our lives and improve our public services – but it must be done safely.

“Here are two issues we’re doing in the present day to make the UK a worldwide chief on the secure growth of this essential expertise.”

It highlighted the appointment of experts Matt Clifford and Jonathan Black as Rishi Sunak’s official representatives to a global AI safety summit the UK is hosting later this year.

No 10 said they will “drive worldwide help for our summit and ensure the UK leads the world in taking a shared strategy to guaranteeing AI security”.

It also announced £13million in additional funding to develop AI technology for the NHS.

In the now-reposted tweet with the graphic, it said: “The UK leads on AI at dwelling – a motive why many corporations wish to make investments right here.

“Google Deep Mind was founded in the UK over a decade ago.

“And we’re dwelling to extra AI corporations than any EU nation, with Open AI and Anthropic AI each opening their first worldwide workplace right here.”

A final tweet in the thread said that the UK is “main on AI globally” with a £100million funding in an AI taskforce.