Question 2 – What types of AI applications do you have/are you planning?

1. We are currently planning (procurement phase) to implement Speech-to-text for transcribing sessions/meetings.
2. LLM’s for document retrieval and chatbots in the future.

Sometimes I use chat gpt when large texts are in question, as I try this tool to help me summarize long reports, to make them shorter, to draft a report and alike. However, I realized that the humans are not to be replaced yet, since the most complex work is still to be done by myself.

So far, I’ve been professionally involved in monitoring the use of AI for the improvement of OCR in historical parliamentary archives. On a personal level, I extensively use ChatGPT for text production and translation.

The Hellenic Parliament also uses AI in speech-to-text transcription of sessions. In the future, we plan to use AI for automatic indexing and documentation of parliamentary materials.

There is no a special AI tool dedicated to parliamentary functions nowadays. The use of commercial applications (e.g. Chat GPT, Gemini, Copilot) is an added value in the parliamentary life. The need for training is essential for parliamentary officials to understand the AI use.

As a parliamentary researcher/analyst, I find tools like Perplexity Pro or NotebookLM to greatly aid me in my research. The former tool is especially important for quickly collecting information from foreign sources in languages I do not understand while the latter enables me to find information among tens of carefully selected sources.
Despite not being directly in charge of overseeing AI planning in my parliament, I suggested these applications of AI to the relevant colleagues from the Office of the Seimas:
1) creating a chatbot that would use internal databases of our parliament and the office of the parliament, and perhaps even the database of all former and current Lithuanian laws to answer queries regarding current legislative processes, rules of operation, and any other questions an MP or a civil servant may have ;
2) creating a separate chatbot to answer less-sensitive queries regular citizens have;
3) regarding the safety and privacy of AI usage, writing up guidelines for safe AI use*, as currently only the Research Unit has those (for itself);
4) regarding the efficiency and opportunities of using AI, the Office of the Seimas needs to either offer paid subscriptions to at least one or two AI tools (the free versions are limited either by restricted functionality or usage limits) or, preferably, dedicate a budget that could be used to pay for AI-related needs that arise;
5) developing an in-house AI system that would simplify law-making processes by finding similarities with existing legislation, identifying possible conflicts with the law or court decisions, and even offering insights into the possible impacts;
6) thinking of how to achieve new and old ambitions of the Office of the Seimas in the light of the new era of no-code solutions that create opportunities for developing applications cheaper, faster, and without the need for advanced skills.

* Guidelines created by Dr. Fitsilis and two other co-authors can be a blueprint for a shortened local version: https://www.wfd.org/sites/default/files/2024-07/wfd-ai-guidelines-for-parliaments-2024-english.pdf