Matt Clifford has been forced to step down as chair of the UK's Advanced Research and Invention Agency (Aria) after MPs raised concerns that his new full-time role at Anthropic, the San Francisco-based AI firm behind Claude, represented a "clear conflict of interest". Clifford had tried to retain both positions simultaneously, with Anthropic saying he would recuse himself from any company-related business at Aria, but pressure from senior figures including Chi Onwurah, chair of the Commons science, innovation and technology committee, made the arrangement untenable. The case has renewed scrutiny of the "revolving door" between government and AI firms, with critics warning it risks undermining public trust and weakening the government's ability to push for cautious AI regulation.

Clifford, 40, will remain at Aria until 6 November before fully joining Anthropic, where he will lead engagement with governments outside the US. He previously served briefly as Keir Starmer's AI adviser, co-founded venture capital firm Entrepreneurs First, advised Rishi Sunak, helped organise the 2023 UK AI safety summit, and contributed to establishing the AI Security Institute. Onwurah welcomed his resignation but said questions remain over how the situation arose and what safeguards protected Aria's governance, while peer Beeban Kidron called for a clearer separation between tech interests and public policy. The episode follows similar moves by Sunak, ex-chancellor George Osborne (to OpenAI) and former deputy PM Nick Clegg (to Meta), and coincided with AI pioneer Geoffrey Hinton backing a parliamentary bill to ban the development of artificial superintelligence.