UK government’s National Data Library works up steam

The UK government’s Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) has completed what it calls the “discovery phase” of its bid to create a National Data Library (NDL).

The NDL was trumpeted as part of the government’s 50-point AI opportunities action plan, based on recommendations made by entrepreneur Matt Clifford to boost the use of artificial intelligence (AI) in the UK, at the start of 2025.

According to DSIT, the NDL discovery phase involved information-gathering from surveys. The department has also consulted the Open Data Institute (ODI), Public Digital, The Startup Coalition, The Tony Blair Institute and Wellcome Trust about what the NDL should be. Its stated goal is to better manage and use data to “radically transform people’s lives” with improved public service delivery, more economic growth and the use of AI.

Nigel Shadbolt, chairman and co-founder of one of the organisations consulted in the “discovery phase”, wrote in Computer Weekly in March 2025: “To support AI innovation and adoption, the government plans to create a new National Data Library – a platform for managing and accessing public sector data. If this is going to be able to provide ethical and secure access to public data assets, it must be designed to be AI-ready from the outset.

“This includes implementing tried-and-tested data hygiene measures championed by organisations such as the ODI: adopting open, interoperable standards for safe data sharing, proactively addressing data gaps through iterative assessment, and instituting clear governance structures that balance innovation with public trust.”

The NDL is a £100m part of an overall £1.9bn investment in DSIT to help it use digital technologies to cut government operating costs. As part of its update, DSIT said it set up an Expert Advisory Group in September 2025, co-chaired by Sarah Hodgetts, director for Geospatial and the National Data Library; and Dom Hallas, executive director at Startup Coalition.

The department also said it has looked at public sector data exploitation in other countries, including Denmark, Estonia, Singapore and the Netherlands.

DSIT said it has run five projects about connecting data across the public sector. These concern supporting people with energy bills, reducing administration burdens for people with long-term health conditions, improving adult social care planning, supporting small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) with access to legal information, and enabling the better use of climate and weather data.

The SME project is aimed at saving businesses some of the estimated £13.6bn a year they bear because of failures to address legal issues, such as contract law and disputes. 

The weather project is aimed at making businesses and councils more resilient to storms and severe weather by better use of Met Office data, alongside AI tools and compute allocation. The department gives an example of a café stocking up on either ice cream or hot chocolate according to the dictates of the data.

As part of its update on the NDL, the department listed other government data initiatives: The National Underground Asset Register, The Department for Education Content Store, The Health Data Research Service (HDRS), The Better Outcomes through Linked Data programme, and the “active pairing of compute with large-scale datasets through Isambard AI and the Genomics England Research Environment”.

The HDRS is intended to begin delivery by the end of this year and be fully operational by December 2030. It will give a “secure single access point to regional and national-scale health datasets, delivering high-impact data assets for research and innovation while embedding rigorous safeguards for privacy, ethics and security”, the DSIT document said.

As part of the NDL programme, the Government Digital Service is running a survey about public sector data use, aimed at businesses, researchers and public bodies. GDS and DSIT have also published a document about making government datasets ready for AI, which falls under the NDL umbrella.

DSIT said it will set out more specific and developed details on the National Data Library in spring 2026.