The UK’s new Prime Minister, Andy Burnham, has appointed Kanishka Narayan as Britain’s first-ever Minister of State for Artificial Intelligence who will attend the PM’s cabinet.

Burnham has also merged the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology with the Department for Business and Trade, and appointed Jonathan Reynolds as Secretary of State for Business, Innovation, Science, and Trade, mirroring the close connections between innovation and technology with business and trade.

In addition, the Culture Department will expand its role in overseeing digital transformation and online harms.

All these moves signal AI governance could become a central priority of Burnham’s premiership as part of a broader strategic competition on technology with the U.S. and China. Europe lags behind both countries in frontier artificial intelligence systems but seeks to position itself as a global leader in AI regulation and standards.

Kanishka Narayan has been appointed as Minister of State (Minister for Artificial Intelligence) jointly in the @cabinetofficeuk and the Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade. He will attend Cabinet. pic.twitter.com/IWxGwmSt2E

— UK Prime Minister (@10DowningStreet) July 20, 2026

The appointment comes just a few days after Xi Jinping launched the new World Artificial Intelligence Cooperation Organization (WAICO), a China-led coalition of 29 nations to be headquartered in Shanghai. China seeks to position itself as the global leader of AI cooperation, governance, and norm-setting.