To celebrate the publication of the National AI Leadership Forum Report, Professor John Kelleher shared an opinion piece titled:
Creating a National AI Leadership Forum
John Kelleher, Director of ADAPT and Professor of Computer Science at Trinity College Dublin.
Ireland has the potential to be a global leader in Artificial Intelligence (AI), but it means being realistic about what we can achieve, and imaginative about finding different ways to foster innovation while still retaining public trust. ADAPT, the Research Ireland Centre for AI-Driven Digital Content Technology, has been navigating these and other questions for a while now, finding new ways to engage with policy-makers, practitioners, and public servants, as well as with people across all the many different areas that will be affected by this transformational technology.
Most recently, ADAPT partnered with William Fry and the Insight Centre to convene a National Forum on AI Leadership that brought together over a hundred leaders to exchange views and suggest recommendations, in a safe and respectful environment. We heard from people across Government departments and Oireachtas committees, from industry and academia, from civil society and ‘Big Tech’. Ideas were presented from experts in healthcare, and banking, media, and the law, as ideas were debated, and critical challenges navigated.
This week, the National AI Leadership Forum Report was published, a direct outcome of those discussions. It sets out twelve clear actions that Ireland can take now to translate ambition into delivery. These include establishing a National AI Office, identifying public-sector pilots to demonstrate trustworthy AI in action, and creating a national ‘AI skills gateway’ to help citizens and SMEs adapt with confidence. In this way, ADAPT and our partners are placing our expertise at the service of the country, providing Government and everyone else involved with new ways of thinking about the massive potential and incredible challenges of artificial intelligence.
A recurring theme throughout the Forum was Ireland’s forthcoming Presidency of the Council of the EU, in the second part of 2026, and the potential to host a major AI Summit. Contributors saw this as a chance to not just lead within Europe, but to demonstrate internationally that a values-led approach to technology is both credible and competitive.
We are a small country, but that can be our advantage. Ireland is agile, connected, and capable of turning ideas into coordinated action quickly. There are areas such as education, healthcare, and language technology where we already lead and where we can show true leadership.
Our National AI Strategy, AI: Here for Good, together with the Digital Ireland Framework, already give us strong foundations. The only thing that is missing is a place where we can all come together to brainstorm, share ideas, and address concerns that different sectors have. The Forum, and now the report, provide that structure. In most things in life, honesty is the best policy, and an honest approach to AI policy can help us develop the best policies.
At the Forum we heard that when it comes to upskilling and protecting workers, speakers were strong on the need to avoid a digital divide. We need to ensure workers have meaningful AI training as we align AI education with real industry needs. Existing funds, or a new fund, could be used for AI upskilling for workers and SMEs. At the same time, AI literacy modules could be embedded across all levels of education. Education remains a competitive advantage for Ireland and AI can help us strengthen it further.
Public service adoption was also high on the agenda and we discussed the need for innovative pilot schemes, involving specially created synthetic or fictional data, to allow for testing in a safe and controlled way. We explored how to create trust, and grow trust, and ensure that when we innovative we bring people with us, showing them the potential, and addressing their concerns. The appetite for collaborative, citizen-involved AI pilots is there, what’s needed now is the framework and leadership to make it happen.
We heard how important AI was for education, and for making sure our young people are given every opportunity to unleash its potential and excel. But we also heard how we can’t forget about other crucial sectors of society, especially the elderly who can benefit from the potential of AI in so many areas, including healthcare.
Despite the great ideas suggested, and the enthusiasm of the participants, it was clear that we don’t yet have all the answers. The pace of change means our frameworks will have to keep evolving. This is why evidence-based dialogue is so essential. We need to continue to gather together as experts and non-experts alike and share our hopes, our fears, our expectations, and our ambitions for how Ireland can lead responsibly.
As a country, we can be a leader in AI, not through scale, but through integrity, agility, and imagination. We have the talent, the trust, and the track record to do it. The National AI Leadership Forum and the report it produced show that Ireland’s leaders are ready to act with urgency and purpose. Together we can demonstrate that even a small nation can make a global impact when it acts with clarity and courage.
