Carney Calls for Global Tech Body to Boost AI Guardrails
Canada wants to see the creation of a global “technology stability” body to help oversee artificial intelligence and ensure it is safe, Prime Minister Mark Carney said.
“There’s a need for coordination,” Carney said in an interview with Bloomberg News on Monday. “Ultimately, a technology stability board, in our view, along the lines of the Financial Stability Board would make sense.”
“It’s an opportunity — and I think ultimately what it’s going to mean is greater value creation and greater value delivery to people.”
The leaders of major AI labs, including Anthropic Chief Executive Officer Dario Amodei, have said development of the most advanced systems must be slowed in order to prevent AI slipping beyond human control and inflicting catastrophic harm.
But US President Donald Trump dismissed calls for artificial intelligence guardrails and slammed Amodei for urging a slowdown in the technology’s development.
Aidan Gomez, CEO of Canada’s Cohere Inc., said he was concerned by Amodei’s call for temporary waivers of antitrust laws to allow for safety-related discussions between competitors. These laws “were set up to prevent the formation of cartels,” Gomez pointed out at a Milken Institute event in Toronto.
“That should raise a huge red flag in terms of what some of the incentives behind this might be,” he said, while adding he didn’t want to downplay the risks of the “incredibly potent” technology.
“What we need is a process by which to come up with the right regulation, and that should include things like testing of these models in advance and an independent third party that isn’t isolated to any one country and isn’t dominated by any one industry player.”
Speaking on the same panel, Royal Bank of Canada CEO Dave McKay said a key aspect of safe AI over time is going to be uniform access to the most powerful tools, which are currently only being selectively released outside the US.
“You need access to the most advanced tools to not only build product, but also make sure you’re cyber safe as a society and as an economy,” McKay said.
Luring Foreign Capital
In the interview, Carney also said his government will announce reforms soon to make Canada’s tax system more competitive, and will accelerate federal approvals on major projects so that they’re done in one year.
“Foreign capital is underallocated to Canada,” Carney said.
Asked about the growing tension between the US and Canada on trade issues, Carney said he thinks it’s still possible for the two sides to reach a “mutually advantageous” deal that would reduce trade barriers. “We’re ready to sit down and negotiate that and move it forward,” he said, adding that he welcomed Trump’s comments over the weekend that he believed the countries could reach an agreement fairly soon.
The prime minister and his top officials are preparing to pitch more than 100 high-profile global investors — including Blackstone Inc., Singapore’s Temasek Holdings Pte and Apollo Global Management — at a summit he has convened in Toronto. The Canadian team has prepared a prospectus of more than 160 projects in need of hundreds of billions of dollars, though some are still in very early stages of planning.
Carney, along with key economic cabinet ministers and some of the country’s most powerful business executives, will meet formally with the out-of-town guests at a gala dinner Monday evening and during a full day of conference discussions at Toronto’s Four Seasons on Tuesday.
Investment opportunities include a proposed crude-oil pipeline to Canada’s west coast, the Ksi Lisims LNG export facility in British Columbia and a C$14.5 billion ($10.4 billion) data-center campus in Alberta. The governments of Ontario and Alberta have also produced their own pitchbooks.
The summit comes during a fraught period of relations with the US, Canada’s largest trading partner. After trade negotiations broke down on Aug. 21, Trump imposed new 50% tariffs on $20 billion of goods imported from Canada, and Carney soon retaliated on a roughly equal amount of US-made products.
Trump officials have repeatedly denigrated Canada over the past few weeks, and Trump ordered Lake Ontario be renamed to Lake America. Last week, US officials announced plans to fully block some Canadian imports such as alcohol and some dairy products, and to restrict Canadian companies from US government contracts.
Despite all of that — or perhaps because of it — Carney is riding a wave of political popularity that gives him greater latitude to pursue his agenda of expanding Canada’s trade and investment relationships with non-US partners.
For months, Carney has been seeking closer ties with allies abroad. After the investment summit ends, he’ll fly to Strasbourg, France, where he and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen are expected to speak about plans to build a closer partnership between Canada and the European Union. That alliance is likely to cover a number of areas, including trade, security, supply chains and access to raw materials, people familiar with the matter told Bloomberg News.
Carney has also traveled extensively throughout the year to countries including China, India, Australia, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Japan, often with the aim of signing partnerships and developing new markets for Canadian exports.
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