- Palantir’s contract with the NHS is soon up for renewal, so UK politicians are saying how they feel
- Politicians are concerned about the business owner, the CEO, and politics in general.
- UK director says Palantir’s FDP software helps reduce wait times
Palantir’s UK boss has defended the company’s contract to handle sensitive citizens’ data as politicians across the country call for a closer look at the company’s controversial role in the NHS.
“We have no interest in patient data in the UK,” Palantir UK executive vice president Louis Mosley explained on the BBC’s Politics Live (via bbc).
This comes after Palantir won a £300m deal in 2023 to run the NHS Federated Data Platform (FDP), which is up for renewal. Reports say all NHS trusts in England were recommended to adopt those tools from this month.
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Palantir continues to defend its presence in the United Kingdom
The FDP was launched to link fragmented NHS systems between GPs, clinics and hospitals to improve waiting list management, bed and operating theater availability and even supply logistics.
“I think for those of us who use the NHS, the lived experience is of disconnected and fragmented systems, explaining who you are to a different person in every ward, at reception,” Mosley said in an attempt to demonstrate exactly where the FDP would play a role.
However, UK citizens and politicians have not been shy about raising concerns about Palantir’s CIA funding, defense contracts, and owner Peter Thiel’s own politics.
Mosley also stressed that Microsoft does not have access to NHS data, even though its tools, such as Excel, are widely used in the NHS and other public bodies.
Politicians from all the UK’s main parties have expressed, to varying degrees, that Palantir should not be allowed to continue trading with the NHS, particularly when its CEO has accused the NHS of being a “hoax”.
More broadly, with Europe pushing hard for technological independence and sovereignty and Britain following suit, such strong influence from an American tech company might not be so welcome anyway.
An increasing number of NHS staff in the UK are reportedly even refusing to use the FDP, with reports of informal boycotts by clinical and non-clinical staff.
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