CalmET: Responsible Edge AI for Employment Dispute Support
Professor Paul McKeown (PI), Northumbria Law School, Northumbria University
Dr Lyndsey Bengtsson (Co-I), Northumbria Law School, Northumbria University
Dr Jamie Harding (Co-I), School of Humanities and Social Sciences, Northumbria University
Sylvia Crow (Research Assistant and PhD Candidate), Northumbria University
Sylvia’s doctoral research explores the relationship between lived experience, formal law and generative AI.
Dan Jackson (Co-Investigator),School of Computer Science, Northumbria University
Dan contributes technical expertise in human-centred computing, AI and the development of interactive digital technologies.
Employment disputes present significant access to justice challenges. Individuals, particularly those without legal representation, may need to navigate complex procedures while managing large volumes of emails, messages, workplace documents and personal accounts of events. Turning this fragmented information into a coherent, evidence-led account can be difficult, especially for people experiencing stress, vulnerability, neurodivergence or low legal literacy.
This project explores whether privacy-preserving Edge AI can help address these barriers. AI processing could take place locally, either on an individual’s own device or within a trusted support environment, such as a charity, law clinic or pro bono legal provider. Rather than routinely transferring sensitive legal and employment information to external cloud-based AI services, the project will test an approach centred on privacy, data minimisation and user control.
The research will explore whether Edge AI can help individuals and those supporting them organise information into clearer chronologies and structured, evidence-led case materials, improving preparedness and engagement with legal support.
The aim is not to automate legal advice or replace professional judgement. Instead, the project investigates how responsible AI can strengthen access to justice while keeping privacy, accessibility and human in the loop at its core.
Impact: The overarching objective is to investigate whether privacy-preserving Edge AI can improve access to justice by helping individuals and trusted support providers manage the information and evidence associated with employment disputes.
A central research question concerns privacy and data protection. By processing information locally, the project will examine whether useful AI functionality can be delivered while reducing the need to transfer, retain or process sensitive information through external cloud services. This provides an opportunity to test privacy-by-design, data minimisation and user control in the context of GDPR and responsible AI.
The project will investigate two complementary models. The first is technology used directly by individuals to help organise their own information and evidence. The second is technology used within trusted support environments, including charities, law clinics, unions, advice organisations and pro bono legal services. For individuals, this could reduce some of the informational and procedural barriers encountered when trying to obtain help or navigate an employment dispute. For charities and legal support providers, it could enable more effective engagement by helping them understand the history, documentation and evidence underlying a dispute.
The anticipated impact is a human-centred model of AI-supported access to justice, where technology assists individuals and support organisations while professional expertise and human judgement remain central.