OpenAI and Anthropic Urge British Lawmakers to Make AI Rules Binding

A Split Among AI Leaders

Representatives of OpenAI and Anthropic told a British parliamentary committee on Tuesday that voluntary safety pledges are no longer enough and that binding laws should be introduced, deepening a public rift with Google DeepMind and Meta, both of which declined to back new legislation.

The Business, Innovation, Science, and Trade Committee heard from four frontier AI firms, four former employees turned whistleblowers, and senior civil servants. Anthropic's head of Europe, Liam Booth-Smith, said the company has "consistently believed that there should be binding rules on companies and that voluntary commitments are not enough." OpenAI vice president Tom Duff Gordon backed a statutory framework and an international convention, saying "there should be some elements that should be mandatory," starting with incident reporting.

Their rivals would not follow. Asked directly whether he supported a statutory framework, Google DeepMind's Owen Larter said the company would focus on standards. Meta's Rob Sherman pointed to Britain's existing regulators, telling MPs they were "not writing on a blank page."

A Voluntary Regime

Civil servants conceded how little the current system compels. Britain's AI Security Institute tests frontier models before release, but only when companies choose to hand them over. Its director, Henry de Zoete, acknowledged the institute relies entirely on the cooperation of companies and foreign governments. Cat Little, the top civil servant at the Cabinet Office, confirmed the regime is voluntary: "At the moment, yes, it is."

De Zoete admitted AISI has no power to stop a company releasing a model it judges too dangerous, and said it does not certify models. He noted the frontier companies are American or Chinese and that "there's only so much we, as the UK, can do." Executives also made clear that British access runs through Washington, with OpenAI saying it will keep sharing models with AISI "as long as we're able to do that under the US government."

Whistleblowers and Warnings

Four former lab researchers testified, including ex-OpenAI staffer Daniel Kokotajlo, who said "I don't think the companies can be trusted to self-regulate." Steven Adler, who left OpenAI in late 2024, said he was not confident in the safety culture across the industry. Geoffrey Irving said the labs wrongly believe they are locked in a race governments will not interrupt.

The hearing coincided with a warning from MI5 director Ken McCallum, who used his annual threat update to flag AI's potential to "change the stakes on existing or even new bioweapons." Committee chair Liam Byrne said the contrast between that warning and the voluntary regime "tells you everything you need to know." He wants ministers to use Britain's coming G20 presidency, alongside South Korea, to broker an international convention that does not depend on the current White House, warning that "the risks are multiplying faster than our safety regime can control."

Sources: Wired Ai