To think Morrisons should be boycotted over their AI adoption?

yeah I’m also not convinced by this. One thing AI is really really bad at is interpreting the law, particularly case law and often also statute law, and nuanced policy documents - the backbone of many fields including ?? Accountancy. IANAn accountant or tax adviser but 95% of the time it gives me the wrong information on tax-adjacent matters, law and policy on diverse topics, which I cover for my job. Usually the error is ignoring changes or oversimplifying or ignoring edge cases.

I’m a senior solicitor and I’m also going to be unnecessary. I give it 6-8 years at this rate.

With good base materials to feed into our AI, I can get most things done without needing juniors on it now. I can use AI to take meeting notes and create minutes complete with action points and clear allocations of responsibilities. I can feed it the initial documents and have it read them and summarise the key points - which it does well (if you pay for the good AI). I can ask it to draft letters and state the appropriate tone to use.

I can use it to write business cases to get senior management buy in. It creates excel spreadsheets for me, word documents and PowerPoints. From a set of bullet points it creates blogs for business development work.

I’m better off than many, because my clients like me for the practical approach I take, which tends to save them money. But eventually they’ll get the same advice from AI as I give - which they can even see to give it the way I would have - and then there’s no reason to pay me.

Happily for me, I don’t mind as I want a change of career anyway. But I’m looking for something that requires actual humans now…

and that is a very fair point, why have a person doing x when a machine can do it in seconds and if the machine is correct then it stands to reason its better to use computers.

I think if you under estimate AI, you're being incredibly naive. I have been a senior executive assistant for 10 years, great global company, I earn really well and am well respected BUT my job simply won't exist in 10 years, Why would it? I'll be as obsolete as a written diary. I might sound blasé but believe me I'm not, I am terrified.

There are so many other jobs that won't be needed anymore - for example, Claud spent 30 seconds sorting out a tax problem which my accountant had been toing and froing on for weeks. I spoke to HMRC and AI's answer was completely correct. So apart from loyalty why would I use my accountant again?

Where do you draw the line OP
here’s what ai says about Mumsnet (and no I haven’t fact checked)

Yes, Mumsnet uses AI, but primarily for behind-the-scenes operations rather than for writing posts. Their approach focuses on data analysis and moderation support while keeping the forum's content human-generated.
Here is a breakdown of how they use the technology:
Moderation and Safety
• Auto-flagging: They use AI tools to scan for specific words or phrases that might violate their talk guidelines.
• Auto-hiding: Certain posts may be hidden automatically by AI until a human moderator can review them.
• Human Oversight: Mumsnet maintains that AI is not used to make final moderation decisions. A human moderator reviews every flagged post because they believe algorithms lack the nuance to handle sarcasm or humour.
Data and Business
• MumsGPT: This is an internal AI-powered qualitative research tool. It helps the company analyse millions of conversations to identify trends and extract brand mentions for their commercial partners.
• Summarisation: They use AI at the backend to summarise information for internal management and product teams to help improve the site.
Partnerships
• The "Other Phone": Mumsnet collaborated with the tech company Nothing and the app SafetyMode to launch a smartphone for children. This device uses AI-powered monitoring to filter harmful content in apps like WhatsApp and flag it for parents.

There's also a difference between robots taking shitty dangerous jobs in mining and jobs in the arts that people love and enrich their lives immeasurably

I don’t really get why people dismiss concerns about job losses so easily. This isn’t the same as old jobs fading out over time AI is affecting a much wider range of work, and much faster.

New jobs might come but not necessarily at the same speed, same amount or for the same people.

https://variety.com/2026/biz/news/disney-layoffs-1000-employees-josh-damaro-memo-1236721266/

Shall we never watch a Disney film again either?

Whist you're at it OP why not take all the radiators out of your home and keep more chimney sweeps in employment too 🙄

These roles probably weren't that productive and AI technologies also need human workers to build and maintain them.

The economy is destroying the planet.

Net zero is costing us and destroying the economy.

It's probably some AI bullshit

You think of the gas , electric ,diesel ,NI and minimum wages increase
there overheads will of increased dramatically overnight
that why prices don’t come down tbh 200 wage will beat make a dint in it

I think any company that doesn't invest in AI will die a death. They have to adapt and they don't then they'll get left behind and I say this as someone whose job will probably disappear in the next few years (which is terrifying but probably true).

The trouble with this is, we've gone past the point of no return with economical and societal factors to be able to return to this style of trading. When men worked and most women stayed at home, they'd have time to go out to the shop and stand in a queue to be served by the shopkeeper. Our global commodity chain now supports the import of goods from different countries which supply our supermarkets. With both sexes working to support their families, shopping is done after/before work or online when they have the time.

I do like the idea of supporting local independent businesses though, but unfortunately a lot of people can't afford to do this. Farm shops can be absolutely extortionate. I understand that this is the cost of goods when it's a small business with less purchasing power, but it still doesn't make it more affordable for the majority of people.

I think it's a fuss over nothing to be honest. Look at the luddites destroying all those machines during the industrial revolution- machines still prevailed in most cases (obviously professions such as roof thatching or shoeing horses can't be replaced by machines).

There is an argument that the luddites weren't anti technology perse, but were protesting against poor working conditions among other things, but I believe it to be more nuanced than this - of course people were still worried about their livelihoods.

All this being said, I do believe AI needs to be used responsibly. For example, in the legal system where AI is being trialled to redact sensitive personal identifiable information about victims within case documentation, I believe that a human being should be cross checking things, which would still save time. It would be like 'marking homework' versus completing the whole task from scratch. The key here in my opinion, is to reduce heavy lifting in repetitive tasks, not to replace human intelligence.

People who don't believe this will have an effect. I come from an area which relied heavily on coal mining. Thatcher put a stop to that and reckoned that those redundant workers would join the service economy instead. These areas have never recovered and the only services you can find are grotty corner shops selling knock off ciggies and the local drug dealers doing a good trade in substances. Nothing was ever done to help these people back into work. Generations of welfare claimants rather than a university education and a naice white collar role somewhere. Who'd have thought it?

This. If you want to boycott companies adopting AI - you’ll need to become extremely self sufficient, as well as keep your money under the mattress.

They are pretty much all at it now.

I don’t think 200 people could be put into stores near their head office. Morrisons doesn’t have that many stores to make it possible without relocation and who would relocate for a minimum wage job?

TBF AI is a problem as well in that it[s a hugely inefficient, energy- and water-intensive technology when we are supposed to be aiming for net zero

Those that were fired can work on the shop floor or is that beneath them? There will always be be manual labour jobs.

I have Morrisons! Rude staff, rubbish points programme and slow to react when it would help shoppers. Nor surprised they are doing this

Sainsbury’s also announced 300 HO job losses in February

both Tesco and Asda have had HO redundancies too.
its about reducing costs, not AI, and keeping the share price buoyant. Oh, and of course ensuring the CEO’s and board get their bonuses

Good question. I work for one of the big 4 (in store) and can honestly say some people at head office appear to have the most pointless jobs imaginable and get paid a lot more than those doing all the hard slog in store. Literally as much use as a chocolate fire guard. Maybe if we had less of these pointless roles there would be more of a budget to open more checkouts, replenish stock and pick orders faster, keep the stores cleaner… not that any of that saved money will go towards anything like that obviously.