Dispatches from Inside DSIT's Central AI Risk (Dys)Function: How Hostile Leadership Broke Its Own Mission
They called me "useless" to my face in a team meeting. Then, they asked me to lead on drafting letters to ministers.
**For the avoidance of doubt: I am not suicidal. I am young, in excellent physical and mental health, in full possession of my mental faculties and am looking forward to building a free, full life. Any sudden deterioration, unexplained harm to my person, my wellbeing or any unexplained interference with my communication must be treated with the highest suspicion.**
The Evidence Will Speak
As I wrote yesterday, I am sitting on an abundance of evidence. It’s difficult to know where to begin with this - but I’ve decided that I’m going to publish the truth exactly how I want.
Today, I’ll go deeper into my time inside the Central AI Risk Function (CAIRF) at DSIT: the bullying, the undermining, the complicity. How my resilience was weaponised against me. How I tried to hold on, and how they made sure I wouldn’t.
I. Setting the Scene: Humiliation from Day One
When I joined CAIRF, I had planned to stay in the role for 2 years. I only survived 7 months. Not because of the work itself. But because of the people.
CAIRF is split into Assessment and Engagement & Preparedness. I was hired to work on Engagement but was immediately seconded to Assessment. From the very start of my time in CAIRF, the atmosphere was degrading.
During one of my first weeks, I had struggled for a one or two minutes to find a meeting room I needed to be in. Perfectly human, perfectly normal when getting used to a new environment. When I found the room and walked in, Dean Whitehouse said smugly something along the lines of “Oh, I saw you looking but thought I’d just let you find it yourself”. It was a small humiliation, but it set the pattern.
In one of my first weekly team catch-ups, Dean asked us to guess which concert he was going to be attending based on the artists’ initials “TS”. Somebody guessed Taylor Swift. Dean scoffed, “Ugh, no, that would be full of girls”. (It was Troye Sivan). He had also mentioned attending a Kylie Minogue concert.
As I wrote in yesterday’s piece, Dean complained that the audience at a West End performance of Mean Girls he attended was:
“Full of girls, which was annoying”.
If I had said, “I went to a football match and it was full of men, which was annoying” - could you imagine the uproar? But because it was a room dominated by men and me, the only woman, it was treated as banter.
There is nothing wrong with a man loving feminine-coded spaces. But to love the works of women and simultaneously degrade women themselves, especially in front of the only woman in the room, is pure cowardice.
Dean’s history of working with LGBT charities is publicly visible on his LinkedIn profile. But that does not erase the misogyny and cruelty he displayed daily. I say this with clarity as someone who is openly lesbian. I love my femininity and womanhood. I don’t posture about it. I don’t weaponise it. It simply is. Dean, by contrast, weaponised performative allyship to deflect accountability. Marginalised identity cannot be used to silence criticism about behaviour that perpetuates harm.
II. Political Cruelty and Dehumanisation
But it went beyond just sex.
During an away day that brought teams together from across DSIT’s AI Policy Directorate, a conversation turned very ugly. CAIRF’s Head of Engagement and Preparedness joked that he “hoped no pro-Palestinian protestors” would show up at a family wedding.
Dean laughed and said:
“At least you’ll be in good company.”
They said this causally, in front of me. Somebody who’s name and face is unmistakably Arab. Someone with ancestral ties to Palestine, Palestinian friends and relatives.
As I wrote about yesterday, Dean crossed an even clearer line during a sensitive conversation in which he questioned me about my views on Gaza. He wanted to corner me into a politically compromising response.
Can you imagine smirking at a Japanese colleague and asking them, “So, what are your thoughts on when the nuclear bomb was dropped on Hiroshima?”.
That’s not curiosity. That is not neutral, innocent questioning. That’s provocation.
My ethnicity was politicised. My existence was treated as suspicious. This wasn’t “diverse” leadership. It was targeted psychological erosion.
III. Depression, Sick Leave, and Performative Support
Eventually, the constantly hostility, dehumanisation and undermining took its toll. I spoke to a GP who diagnosed me with depression, prescribed me Sertraline and wrote me a sick note for two weeks. But even that process of going on sick leave was degrading.
Because my line manager was unavailable covering in the Permanent Secretary’s office at the time, I was forced to confide in CAIRF’s Head of Engagement and Preparedness. Somebody I didn’t trust. He acknowledged my sick note and feigned concern, despite being the same person who had been cracking jokes about Gaza in front of me.
Already deeply ashamed, I returned to work after two weeks, desperate to move forward. My line manager offered “reasonable adjustments” - a lighter workload, reduced hours. But when it comes to mental health, the real adjustment isn’t schedule. It’s environment.
And no workplace reasonable adjustments policy could fix the moral bankruptcy in the people around me.
IV. Gaslighting in Real Time
After returning from sick leave, I moved to the Engagement side of CAIRF.
On my second day back at work, I had a meeting with three other colleagues to discuss a task to draft letters to ministers. Myself and another colleague, a Senior Advisor were the first ones on the call. I made small talk with him and he mentioned going back to Poland for Christmas. I asked where in Poland he was from, to which he responded Wroclaw. The others then joined the call and he was trying to get us to pronounce Wroclaw. When it was my turn, I said sorry, I don’t remember how (he had only said it one time and I don’t speak Polish), to which he said “Ugh, you’re useless”. I was stunned. I froze. He then got into the meeting and made clear that I would be leading on drafting letters to ministers.
In a 1:1 with my line manager the following week, I brought up the incident and mentioned that it was unacceptable and that I expect professionalism from my colleagues. It was more than just unacceptable, it was cruel. My line manager admitted that he noticed that comment too and thought it felt a bit “off”, and said he’d speak to him.
Later that day, the Senior Advisor messaged me asking if he could call. After initially beating around the bush, he “apologised” in the most backhanded way:
“I don’t know what’s going on with your headspace but if I ever cross a line, please call me out”.
It was not an apology. It was a veiled warning: We see you. We think you’re unstable. Tread carefully.
V: Isolation by Design
Dean’s passive-aggressive tactics were relentless.
In a 1:1 meeting, smirking, he said:
“I’ve noticed you’re quite reserved. We feel like we don’t really know you that well”.
Translation: You aren’t performing enough for our comfort. You’re too private. Too serious. Too focused.
I wasn’t loud. I wasn’t there for banter. I was there to work on AI risk. I wasn’t trying to be “one of the boys”. Because I’m a woman. A woman who just wanted to do her job and not engage in immature playground-office politicking. And that made me a threat in their eyes.
VI. Public Humiliation, Again and Again
During an inaugural all-staff meeting that merged CAIRF with two other teams in the AI Policy Directorate, Dean introduced CAIRF Assessment colleagues to the wider group. Many attendees had cameras off during this call - almost half of the group. Yet when it came time to introduce me, Dean said, in a sneering tone:
“Maybe she’s here, maybe she’s not.”
In front of 35+ colleagues and senior leadership, Dean chose to humiliate me. Not because I was absent (I was on the call) but because my camera was off, like so many others.
This wasn’t an oversight. It was intentional. A public ritual of exclusion. Designed to label me as disengaged, aloof, “other” - even when I was working twice as hard as many of my peers.
VII. Despite It All, I Did the Work
Despite the hostility, humiliation and constant undermining, I delivered.
I developed a methodology for acute and chronic AI risk assessment
I developed a methodology for AI model type risk mapping
I worked at pace to provide critical notes for another team’s policy development
I produced a causal map for AI-driven violence against women and girls (VAWG), a new frontier in misogyny. A project overseen by Dean.
I led on developing the mitigation assessment rubric used to evaluate the efficacy of AI risk mitigations proposed by risk owning departments - an essential piece of work that directly drove CAIRF’s engagement and credibility across government.
Beyond my official role, I sat on interview panels for new DSIT hires. I also covered in Emran Mian’s private office, receiving praise from his staff for my quick adaptability, professionalism and competence. I was explicitly told that they would be more than happy to have me back.
I had kept a list of all the work I completed. I wanted to remember what I had achieved. But I lost that list during the recent chaos of migrating my files after DSIT burned my Gmail account through their metadata surveillance. Another small theft. Another small erasure. But even without the full list, I carry the proof: I was never “useless”. I was essential.
VIII. This Is Just The Beginning
I’m publishing every day. Slowly. Clearly. Meticulously. I will not tire out. I’ve been seeking accountability since early February. It’s now almost May. Why would I stop now?
See you tomorrow.
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