UK civil service to hold more in-person job interviews after surge in AI-generated applications

The U.K. civil service, which delivers the work of the British government, plans to hold more in-person job interviews and reduce the role of written personal statements. The aim is to counter a surge in applications produced with artificial intelligence (AI). Politico Europe reported the plans on 13 November, citing a government official.

According to the official, recruiting managers have seen a sharp rise in applications for each role, yet the number of viable candidates across the system has not changed. Cabinet Secretary Antonia Romeo believes some applicants use AI to produce bland personal statements, which lets them apply for more posts but hides their personal skills.

In the most extreme cases, the official said, whole applications and even virtual interviews seemed to have been generated by bots. In at least one case, civil servants grew so suspicious during a video call that the candidate was not a real person that they ended the interview early.

What is changing

The civil service intends to move away from personal statements. For flagship recruitment schemes, leaders are considering bringing back compulsory face-to-face interviews. The changes are likely to be part of a wider review of Whitehall that Romeo is due to deliver to Prime Minister Andy Burnham by summer 2027.

In her annual lecture on Tuesday, Romeo said she planned to "strip back and simplify" recruitment to attract the most talented people from all backgrounds, and to end "formulaic job ads, generic interviews and slow processes". That includes scrapping "success profiles", a core part of the bureaucratic selection process. A new selection framework is due from April 2027.

More face-to-face interviews may make some hiring slower, at a time when civil service budgets are under heavy pressure. Romeo also said AI would "radically rewrite" how Whitehall works, including through "frontier teams" in departments and a more AI-focused "Fast Stream" programme for university graduates.

Dave Penman, general secretary of the First Division Association, a union for senior civil servants, said it had also noticed an increase in suspected AI-generated applications. He said these concerns do not mean the whole system is broken, and suggested the civil service faces what many other areas of recruitment are facing.