INSIDE THE TONY BLAIR INSTITUTE with @LHreports, @PeterKGeoghegan and @maybulman Since 2021, Larry Ellison’s personal foundation – the Larry Ellison Foundation – has donated or pledged at least £257m to the Tony Blair Institute, making it a think tank like no other in the UK. Ellison donations have helped it grow to more than 900 staff, working in at least 45 countries. Speak to anyone close to Tony Blair and they will confirm his conviction in the revolutionary potential of AI. The former prime minister believes it will completely reshape the global economy in ways that political leaders the world over are only just starting to realise. But it is also the case that Ellison’s Oracle has major commercial interests at stake in the question of which companies get access to Britain’s most valuable data. In the course of our investigation into the TBI, we spoke to 29 current and former staff, most on condition of anonymity. While there is no suggestion of illegality, there are growing concerns about the extent to which the interests of a US tech billionaire are being represented by the former prime minister. Some TBI staff – including a number who left in recent years because of Ellison’s influence – say the cash injection has produced a culture that is dominated by a form of AI boosterism, and which, as they see it, amounts to lobbying for Oracle. The TBI, however, was welcomed by Keir Starmer’s Downing Street operation, which includes many figures with close connections to the former prime minister. Peter Kyle, an adviser in Blair’s second term, was appointed technology secretary and called on governments to show “a sense of humility” towards Big Tech companies. In an August 2024 paper on “preparing the NHS for the AI era”, TBI found “good reasons” for building new digital health records with an existing system run by Oracle.