Governments are under pressure to modernise. AI is moving quickly. Public expectations are changing with it.
But the challenge is no longer whether governments should use AI. It is how they can adopt it responsibly, confidently, and in ways that maintain public trust.
Trust Imperative 5.0: Building Trust in Government through Practical AI Assurance, from Boston Consulting Group, Salesforce, and the Centre for Public Impact, explores why many governments that already have AI governance principles and frameworks in place struggle to make them work in practice.
The report focuses on:
- Whether AI principles and assurance frameworks are achieving their intended objectives
- The experience of people in government who are applying AI assurance frameworks
- How frameworks are impacting governments’ adoption and utilization of AI
- Lessons learned and recommendations for governments to make frameworks more effective
AI adoption needs to move at the speed of trust
The report challenges the assumption that safety and speed are a trade-off. Instead, assurance can help governments adopt AI confidently while building public trust in the process.
Governments can use AI to improve public outcomes by:
- Making risk triage easier
- Clarifying accountability
- Embedding assurance into delivery processes
- Strengthening internal capability
- Creating reusable artifacts, and
- Redesigning assurance for agentic systems.
Why this matters now
People are becoming more familiar with AI in their everyday lives and the expectation for governments to modernise is rising. Governments must improve public services while maintaining public trust and accountability.
The next phase of AI in government is not about establishing AI governance principles and frameworks. It is about making them work in practice.
Download the report
Trust Imperative 5.0: Building Trust in Government through Practical AI Assurance explores what is working well in AI assurance, where further refinement could improve outcomes, and how governments can adopt AI confidently while enhancing public trust.
