Alex Sobel Tables UK Bill to Ban Superintelligence as Government Weighs Targeted Action

Labour MP Alex Sobel has tabled a bill to ban the development, deployment and operation of artificial superintelligence in the UK. It would also give the government powers to monitor and control development across the AI supply chain, including at the chip level.

The proposal defines artificial superintelligence as AI that would outperform humans in most domains. Sobel tabled it in the House of Commons, so it is a legislative proposal rather than a current restriction. It is private legislation and has not been enacted.

A wider proposal after the kill-switch setback

The bill follows Sobel’s unsuccessful effort to add a government kill switch for threatening AI agents to the Cyber Security and Resilience Bill. Peers also unsuccessfully tried to restore that measure in the House of Lords the week before the new proposal was reported.

What Sobel’s earlier measure sought

• It would have allowed the government to shut down a data center hosting an AI agent that presented a threat.
• The government said existing cybersecurity legislation already allowed intervention over compromised systems posing a national-security risk, including requiring an entity to stop using and isolate an AI model.

The government’s narrower response

The UK government said the bill’s measures are not the right approach. It is considering whether additional targeted interventions may be needed for the most significant AI-related national-security risks, without identifying a specific measure.

ControlAI drafted the bill; the nonprofit is backed by Jaan Tallinn, a Skype founding engineer and former DeepMind investor director. Sobel has said he will present the proposal in full in November 2026. He hopes it could lead the UK to work with other countries on an international ban, but that is his stated aim, not a government commitment.