- Palantir’s NHS contract is soon up for renewal, so UK politicians are saying how they feel
- Politicians are worried about the company’s owner, CEO and general politics
- UK head says Palantir’s FDP software helps cut wait times
Palantir’s UK boss has defended the company’s contract to handle sensitive citizen data as politicians across the country call for closer examination of the company’s controversial role with the NHS.
“We have no interest in patient data in the UK,” Palantir UK Executive Vice-Chair Louis Mosley explained on BBC’s Politics Live (via the BBC).
This comes after Palantir won a £300 million deal in 2023 to run the NHS Federated Data Platform (FDP), which is up for renewal. Reports say that all NHS England trusts were advised to adopt those tools from this month.
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Palantir continues to defend its UK presence
The FDP was launched to link fragmented NHS systems across GPs, clinics and hospitals to improve waiting list management, bed and operating theatre availability and even supply logistics.
“I think those of us who use the NHS, the lived experience is one of disconnected, fragmented systems, explaining who you are to a different person on every ward, at the front desk,” Mosley said in a bid to demonstrate exactly where the FDP would play a role.
However, UK citizens and politicians haven’t been shy to voice their concerns over Palantir’s CIA funding, defense contracts and owner Peter Thiel’s own politics.
Mosley also stressed that Microsoft has no access to NHS data, even though its tools, like Excel, are used widely across the NHS and other public bodies.
Politicians from all major UK parties have expressed, in varying degrees, that Palantir should not be allowed to continue operating with the NHS, particularly when its CEO has accused the NHS of being a ‘delusion’.
More broadly, with Europe pushing technological independence and sovereignty hard and Britain following suit, such heavy influence from an American tech company might not be so welcome anyway.
A growing number of NHS staff in the UK are even reportedly refusing to use the FDP, with reports of informal boycotts from both clinical and non-clinical staff.
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