Victorian minister says NextDC lobby letter was drafted by AI
single source· 1 articles · confidence: low · first seen 2026-09-15 15:00 UTC
What this means for you
Nothing to act on yet. No planning decision has changed, the alleged errors have not been described, and the published excerpt carries no response from NextDC. If you are scoping datacentre capacity in Victoria, the relevant signal is political rather than technical: approvals are contested in an election year, so timing and local opposition now carry as much weight as cost.
The Guardian reports that Victoria's jobs minister, Melissa Horne, accused NextDC — an ASX-listed datacentre operator — of using artificial intelligence in correspondence asking her to lobby a colleague in support of a large expansion of its "hyperscale AI factory". The exchange, between Horne and NextDC chief executive Craig Scroggie, allegedly contains AI-created errors, which the published excerpt does not describe. It comes before a state election, as community objections to datacentres sharpen. No approval decision, and no response from NextDC, appears in the excerpt.
Key facts
- ·Victorian jobs minister Melissa Horne accused ASX-listed NextDC of using AI while asking her to lobby a colleague over a datacentre expansion, according to The Guardian. source
- ·The correspondence was between Horne and NextDC chief executive Craig Scroggie. source
- ·The Guardian reports the correspondence allegedly contains AI-created errors; the excerpt does not describe them. source
- ·The lobbying sought support for a "hyperscale AI factory" expansion. source
- ·The report says the exchange reflects rising sensitivity to community concerns about datacentres before the Victorian state election. source
What the sources say
- The Guardian AI — Exclusive account of a minister's claim that a datacentre operator's lobbying letter bore signs of machine drafting.
Sources
The original reporting. Follow these — they did the work.