First rights-based AI framework launched for UK justice system

This initiative seeks to harness AI’s potential while mitigating its risks, ensuring that technology serves justice fairly and effectively.

The justice system is central to democracy and individual lives, deciding matters from child custody to criminal sentencing and financial disputes. However, it faces significant challenges, including court backlogs stretching for years, a lack of access to legal aid, and overcrowded prisons. The Government has committed to using AI to ‘revolutionise’ public services, and AI is already being used in police surveillance, legal research, and advisory tools.

However, past scandals such as the Post Office Horizon case and the Dutch child benefits scandal—where thousands were wrongly accused of fraud due to flawed algorithms—highlight the risks of unregulated technology. The UK justice system also has the most significant data gaps of any public service, making responsible AI use particularly challenging.

Unlike most approaches that focus on AI ethics, this new report introduces a rights-based perspective grounded in enforceable legal principles. It establishes two key requirements for AI use in the justice system:

1. Goal-led deployment – AI tools must directly support one or more core justice system objectives: access to justice, fair and lawful decision-making, and transparency.
2. Duty of responsibility – All stakeholders involved in AI’s design, development, and deployment must uphold the rule of law and human rights at every stage.

Drawing on international examples and extensive research, the report argues that this framework can enable safe and effective AI adoption in the justice sector and could be adapted for other public services.

Sophia Adams Bhatti, co-author of the report and Chair of JUSTICE’s AI programme, says “Given the desperate need to improve the lives of ordinary people and strengthen public services, AI has the potential to drive hugely positive outcomes. Equally, human rights and the rule of law drive prosperity, enhance social cohesion, and strengthen democracy. We have set out a framework which will allow for the positive potential of both to be aligned.”

Stephanie Needleman, Legal Director of JUSTICE, adds “The justice system holds people’s liberty, families and livelihoods in its hands, but it is currently in crisis. We desperately need solutions to improve its fairness and efficiency. AI isn’t a cure-all, and its use carries big risks – to individuals and to our democracy if people lose trust in the law through more scandals like Horizon. But it also offers potential solutions. We must therefore find ways to harness it safely in service of a well-functioning justice system. Our rights-based framework can help us navigate this challenge.”