Whitehall’s “clear” datacenter policy still comes with three doors

Speaking to the House of Commons Science and Technology Committee, Liz Lloyd said that after the government scrapped the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, liaison with the tech industry on datacenter construction moved to the Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade.

Lloyd, who works across BIST and the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, said digital infrastructure sits within DCMS. She also acknowledged that some responsibilities overlap.

“In terms of sector responsibilities, that is clear that technology, sorry, that telecom sits with DCMS and datacenters with BIST. When you're actually in an industry or you're trying to run a business, that that that is clear,” the junior minister told MPs, according to The Register.

This is the sort of answer that makes sense inside an organogram and starts to wobble as soon as it meets a real project. A datacenter is not just a policy label. It is a building, a telecoms site and an enormous power demand, all at once.

The Register noted that power would appear to fall to the Department for Energy and Net Zero. Planning permission rests with local government, while overall planning policy lies with the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government.

So Lloyd’s claim was not that one department does everything. It was that the lines are intelligible. That is a narrower argument, and probably the only one available given the way Whitehall is arranged.

The complication is not hypothetical. The Register pointed to Microsoft’s decision earlier this month to withdraw from plans for Britain’s largest AI supercomputer after difficulties securing power for the facility.

That does not settle the broader question of whether the structure works. It does, however, make the hearing harder to read as a tidy reassurance. The formal division of responsibilities may be clear to ministers. For anyone trying to get a datacenter built, “clear” still seems to involve being passed between departments.