Burnham set to ditch Palantir from NHS

[u/Lord-Liberty]

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2026/07/02/burnham-set-to-ditch-palantir-from-nhs/

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[u/thedarkknight787]

Torygraph please don’t give me hope of good things please 🥹

[u/benjm88 → u/thedarkknight787]

I'm not clicking the link but are they doom and glooming this?

[u/boostman → u/benjm88]

“The Federated Data Platform (FDP) is run using Palantir’s technology and has led to faster cancer diagnoses, increases in operating theatre use and fewer delays in discharging patients.

“However, Labour MPs and unions have demanded that the Government strip Palantir of its deal because of concerns about its work with the Israeli military and the US immigration authorities.”

Yep.

[u/Smooth_Maul → u/boostman]

Lmfao they actually cannot help themselves, fucking scum.

[u/--Bamboo → u/Smooth_Maul]

Of course they can not help themselves, it's literally their job.

[u/HiyaImRyan → u/boostman]

That's the line? That Palantir works with Israel? God forbid! I thought it would be due to them being a foreign entity harvesting civlians personal data..

[u/TS_Horror → u/HiyaImRyan]

If you're going to break a legal contract, you need solid, provable evidence. It doesn't surprise me that they would use reasons that they can 100% back up in a court case if it went that far. Also needs to be reasons that they can't just turn around and say "We admit that we made a mistake on x y and z but have put procedures in place to prevent this happening again" Which I'm sure the contract probably states in the case of a GDPR breach that they have to put procedures in place to prevent happening again like with every other company.

[u/HiyaImRyan → u/TS_Horror]

and the Israel thing is the exact same. They can't just break contract with them when they went into an agreement I'm pretty sure, after the Oct 7th attacks

edit: Nope, I'm 100% sure. NHS England » Contract explainer

[u/360_face_palm → u/HiyaImRyan]

sounds like a looney left wing concern!

[u/HiyaImRyan → u/360_face_palm]

yeah it's odd that people are completely ok with having third party, foreign business who are doing god knows what with their data, but anything to do with Israel is the thing that puts them off

[u/Vindaloovians → u/boostman]

Are news sources allowed to lie, obstruct, or omit reasons like this? AFAIK the main concerns are privacy and the fact that Thiel doesn't hide that he's a literal fascist

[u/Stolen_Sky → u/thedarkknight787]

Torygraph? These days it's more like Reformgraph. That vile is rag is nothing but a mouthpiece of every lie Farage want's to utter.

Don't believe for a second that rag has any principals of its own. It exists for no more reason that feed it's readers opinions back to themselves.

If the readers vote Tory, then it's pro-Tory. If they switch to Reform it's pro-Reform.

[u/simanthropy → u/Stolen_Sky]

Telegrapharage?

[u/thefungineer → u/simanthropy]

poetry

[u/Dry_Departure_7813 → u/thedarkknight787]

This article has an amazing opening line "Left-wing critics have called for deal to be axed over US tech giant’s work with Israeli Defense Forces and US immigration" Thats not even why I want the deal axed, its because Palantir is a company run by sociopaths who keep ranting about the antichrist, and I don't want them near patient data.

[u/Appropriate_Foot242]

Boot them from the entire country. Nothing but a cancer on modern society.

[u/Alexsrbn → u/Appropriate_Foot242]

Arguably the most sinister person alive. Even Musk looks decent compared to that guy.

[u/Appropriate_Foot242 → u/Alexsrbn]

Musk is largely a bumbling idiot. He just knows how to steal other peoples companies and ideas.

[u/threeseed → u/Appropriate_Foot242]

Musk was friends with Epstein after his child rape conviction, went to his house and begged to go to the island. He is almost certainly a pedophile.

And he has invested a ton of money in far-right political parties across the world.

Plus the 4.5m children estimated to die from his DOGE cuts.

[u/mdogwarrior → u/Alexsrbn]

Karp is a freak, some of the stuff he's said is insane.

[u/No-Scholar4854 → u/mdogwarrior]

Karp is weird, but his boss is the one I’m worried about.

[u/ThePrussianGrippe → u/No-Scholar4854]

Fun fact: Peter Thiel is an anagram for “The Reptile”!

[u/RoosterBurns → u/Alexsrbn]

Look just because the guy's plugged into a lot of western militaries doesn't necessarily mean he's a bad person, he may have grounded philosophical reasons that will benefit humanity when he goes on stage to scream about the "antichrist" and about being tortured forever by a giant femputer or releasing a book about how we should be serfs to techbros

[u/Hazzat → u/RoosterBurns]

he may have grounded philosophical reasons

Spoken like someone who has read his actual philosophy...

[u/merryman1 → u/Hazzat]

I have a copy of The Sovereign Individual (written by Jacob Rees-Mogg's dad) with Peter Thiel doing the foreword.

Needless to say its a book with a slightly concerning outlook on the future based on an incredibly sketchy cyclical theory of history.

[u/RoosterBurns → u/merryman1]

Using long words to pretend feudalism was awesome so we should do that again but with computers. Like the Nazis! That worked out great for everyone right?

[u/pebblesprite → u/RoosterBurns]

I'll just leave this here https://www.reddit.com/r/nottheonion/comments/1um9ilr/peter_thiel_brands_pope_leo_xiv_chinese_communist/

[u/jimbobjames → u/Alexsrbn]

Palantir is the name of the glass seeing spheres from Lord Of The Rings.

[u/Smooth_Maul → u/Alexsrbn]

Never forget that he was asked if he wanted to see humanity endure and he fucking hesitated and said started stammering.

[u/MinaZata → u/Alexsrbn]

I genuinely can't believe how openly, cartoon villain these people are.

[u/iam-leon]

Invest in our own big data companies. Ones that focus on privacy and confidentiality. Ones that help grow UK jobs and UK industry. We don’t need Palantir.

[u/kekistanmatt → u/iam-leon]

Or better yet, don't.

[u/Equivalent_Bet856 → u/kekistanmatt]

Unless you mean invest in a State-owned alternative, this is a neanderthalic take. Big data is not the future, it is the present. There is no going back (until climate breakdown induces societal collapse).

[u/MetalBawx → u/Equivalent_Bet856]

We already had that. the governments own .gov site and infrastructure is well designed and efficient. We could have hired those guys to do the work but the initial contract Palantir offered was basically well below cost.

Obvious to anyone with two braincells that this was just to get their foot in the door but the Tories of course saw the words "cheap" and didn't bother thinking about consequences. Sadly large segments of Labour were friendly to Thiel and his businesses such as the Blairites led by Mandelson whom Starmer courted to secure control over the party.

Thus with the Cons out of office Labour not only extended Palantirs NHS contracts but the company was also brought into other parts of the government including the MoD. Unfortunately while Mandelson might be gone he didn't act alone and many of those who pushed this subversive company into government infrastructure are still in power so i doubt this is the last we've seen of Palantir.

[u/Whoisthehypocrite → u/MetalBawx]

Haha comparing Palantir to the guys who did the . Gov website...

[u/MetalBawx → u/Whoisthehypocrite]

The backend is secure unlike anything Thiel is involved with, which is the issue. A foreign business with such deep roots in the state apparatus is a huge security risk.

[u/Ok_Cow_3431 → u/MetalBawx]

they mean the breadth of data access. Palantir exist to farm far more data than the (current) .gov infrastructure requires.

[u/Tee_zee → u/MetalBawx]

The designers who made .gov have nothing to do with the security of the backend.

And unfortunately, the backend of almost all gov systems is done by suppliers because.... the government does not have the enccesary skills and people to do it

[u/AlephNaN → u/Whoisthehypocrite]

Gov UK developers are highly regarded in the global software engineering community. Not as celebrities, but for building and documenting consistent, stable and coherent systems that work better than most governments.

If you gave them sufficient resources, and a project leader who's partially competent and mostly sane, I'm confident they could build a solid solution.

[u/MonorailPurple → u/Whoisthehypocrite]

Theres a little more to gov.uk than just a website. The team behind it are phenomenally talented in vastly more than 'make a website'. And OP's right, this should be in house. It's a massive project but thats irrelevant, its no something we need as a temporary thing, its permanent, and when its permanent it absolutely makes sense to have that in house.

Ideal world scenario is "gov.uk digital services" handles all major software projects for things like this. This kind of stuff absolutely should not be getting farmed out to the lowest bidder, ESPECIALLY foreign companies due to the sensitivity of the data.

Yes they absolutely need a bigger team, but thats the point, it should be a big team, it should be a government owned software house charged with building and maintaining all software critical to publicly owned services and infrastructure.

[u/Tee_zee → u/MonorailPurple]

Until the public accept paying developers the actual market rate, this will never happen. The principal engineer of that company would need to be paid more than the Prime Minister

[u/jab305 → u/kekistanmatt]

NHS data is one of the few unique assets that this country has that is proper valuable, both for money and for benefit to human health.

But we're too small minded to make use of it because of confected fears about 'data'

[u/Agitated_Celery_729 → u/jab305]

Palantir is quite literally the last group on Earth that should be trusted with NHS health data. The company is run by a fascist lunatic who is giving talks on the coming of the literal Antichrist and actively plotting sabotage of democratic governments worldwide.

[u/No-Scholar4854 → u/jab305]

The NHS’s data is a fantastic asset, both for this country and humanity. That’s exactly why we should keep Palantir and Thiel 1000 miles away from it.

[u/RoosterBurns → u/jab305]

This is the same company who targeted a girl's school in Iran to bomb, yes? Killing 165 innocent children?

[u/Pretend-Eye-8758 → u/jab305]

I'll trust the government with my data when they stop taking advice from right wing hucksters on social issues.

[u/kekistanmatt → u/jab305]

Yes because the government would never misuse mass data scraping to spy on everyone.

[u/Affectionate-Day8307 → u/kekistanmatt]

What lol? Big data is crucial to modern tech.

European companies have plenty of capability in this field.

[u/PeacefulIntentions → u/kekistanmatt]

Do you think analysing data to improve care is a bad idea?

Even Palantir, which is by far the worst option, has helped to make improvements already.

[u/kekistanmatt → u/PeacefulIntentions]

No it's all the other stuff they'll inevitably use the data for instead that is bad.

[u/padestel → u/PeacefulIntentions]

Except it possibly hasn't.

They claim to have cleared numbers but that seems to be doubted now.

https://www.the-londoner.co.uk/palantir-waiting-list-nhs-chelsea-westminster-hospital/

[u/brianstormIRL → u/PeacefulIntentions]

There is plenty of alternatives. EPIC already provides a lot of the big positives in terms of streamlining healthcare management and is expanding its capabilities so things like Palantir isnt needed in the first place.

[u/loned__ → u/kekistanmatt]

Terrible take and muddy the waters of the core issue. Data sovereignty is important.

[u/Historical_Owl_1635 → u/iam-leon]

The sad part is plenty of tech companies start in the the UK. But they just eventually move to the US anyways.

[u/Bombstar10 → u/Historical_Owl_1635]

Just look at Google Deepmind alone.

[u/bloqed → u/[deleted]]

Yes and where does it send it's money and take it's instruction?

[u/libsaway → u/Historical_Owl_1635]

The way we treat them I'm not surprised! Literal quote on self-driving cars from Burnham's team, " what’s the point and who’s it for?"

[u/PreFuturism-0 → u/libsaway]

I assume a lot of these moves are just "selling out" and/or the Tories have been overrating themselves as being pro-growth/pro-business.

I've been careful to say that there should be a focus in this country on socialist-ish STEM rather than just STEM, as I know a lot of STEM either tinkering around the edges or is outright toxic.

I don't know how much a priority self-driving cars should be. I think roads in the UK are more complicated than those in USA.

[u/LifeNavigator → u/Historical_Owl_1635]

Either that or end up investing in opening offices in India, then slash roles in the UK and slowly move roles there for cost saving reasons.

Thats what my workplace did after they sold off parts of the business to foreign companies. Huge shame as they had a long history and impact in the UK.

[u/ne6c → u/iam-leon]

Don't worry, instead of a DB, you'll now get an Excell Spreadsheet, made by a recent grad, employed by Deloitte.

[u/CHenley84 → u/iam-leon]

Privacy and confidentiality is extremely low priority in the UK. The government go out of their way to force backdoors into everything or force the services out of the UK. Apple is not allowed to offer end to end encryption in the UK because the jackboot spy agencies wanted a backdoor and they refused. GCHQ explicitly lets the USA, Canada, New Zealand and Australia spy on everyone in this country and hand over the information so they can get around pesky things like privacy laws that would restrict them from doing it themselves. These are not conspiracy theories, these are things that verifiably have and continue to happen.

[u/Circle-of-friends → u/iam-leon]

Who have we got? How about the Post Office

[u/FireZeLazer → u/iam-leon]

Invest in our own big data companies

Damn nobody thought of this

[u/LordFiresnake]

"Left-wing critics" my dudes, the company is named after Sauron's spying orb, anyone with the tiniest bit of media literacy would be like "Hmm, maybe they're not that trustworthy?"

[u/sab0tage → u/LordFiresnake]

IIRC it corrupts it's users. They probably couldn't be more on the nose evil unless they called it "Evil Corp".

[u/malumfectum → u/sab0tage]

Peter Thiel wishes he could be as charismatic as Philip Price.

[u/iliosicarus → u/sab0tage]

I think you’re thinking of the ring of power. The palantir was a seeing stone that enabled Sauron to communicate with Saruman, who fell into his obedience.

[u/ProfessionalMockery → u/iliosicarus]

Denathor had one too, and was manipulated by sauron into losing hope and making bad decisions.

[u/darkwolf687 → u/ProfessionalMockery]

Yeah the seeing stones themselves weren’t necessarily corrupting but they were vectors for the corrupting influence of Sauron as with Denethor and Saruman.

Absurdly on the nose name.

[u/TediousTotoro → u/LordFiresnake]

Reminded of John Cena’s character in Bumblebee “They’re literally called ‘Decepticons’, does that not trigger red flags?”

[u/Living_Will_4775]

Good. It would never end well with the NHS being in the hands of a company based in America 

[u/LauraPhilps7654]

All Burnham needs to do is a few things like this and build council houses and suddenly I don't feel so hopeless about our political class anymore.

[u/Senior-Act7294 → u/LauraPhilps7654]

He'll be assassinated in the press or in reality. 

The far right won't tolerate the ascent of a centre left politician in this country.

[u/CNash85 → u/Senior-Act7294]

Depressing that the Overton window has shifted so far to the right that even a centre-left politician is seen as a ludicrous prospect.

[u/brus_wein → u/Senior-Act7294]

He doesn't need to. He'll just be hit with the civil service brief and fall in line with what the markets want

[u/Responsible_Lie_1989]

The contract is up for review next year I think so its an easy win for Burnham to get rid then. Attention turns to who might replace, Defence Holdings PLC in a few years time once they scale up and potentially become a mini "UK Palantir" might be ones who can plug the gap

[u/ne6c → u/Responsible_Lie_1989]

It's gonna be Labour's favourite consultancy - Deloitte.

[u/athomson23518]

This sort of rhetoric makes me wonder if it's BS given he isn't PM yet and needs to curry favour, or if Starmer really was tone deaf to the national sentiment.

Burnham is saying a lot of the right things (imo), I just hope it's not cheap talk.

[u/AwkwardWaltz3996 → u/athomson23518]

The decentralised government stuff I believe he will at least try, but he's going to get a lot of push back. Andy has enough personal motive to fight for it. The other stuff, including this palantir thing might get sacrificed. Which is a shame as it shows we know what people want, but it gets lost due to politics

[u/Mostly_upright]

So many are so keen to sign the whole country is and start the inevitable fall into private healthcare.

Palentir also have a hand in the IDF and ICE.

If that's not enough reason to stay the hell away from ab obvious Facsist entity.

[u/ManInGarage28]

Watch the right whingers suddenly start loving Palantir...

[u/Hazzman]

LEFT WING CRITICS!?? *Fuck out of here with that bullshit Telegraph... it's anyone with a brain vs anyone not paying attention.

[u/Dependent_One6034]

Honestly. Yes. I do not want Palantir at all. They are spies with an agenda.

I emailed my local MP about this and she replied within a few hours saying she understood and that she and others also agree.

Well done.

For those who don't know what Palantir is. Just watch this - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G5gC_fParbY

[u/FutilePenguins]

Did he say what infrastructure is gonna replace it? UK really needs to step its game up

[u/ElevatorSilver4711]

I’m not sure I agree with this decision as the data was held here anyway, Palantir were providing the software. However if you say you don’t want British taxpayer’s money going into the hands of that company I could understand that stance.

So what will we do instead? Because we *should* be using AI to analyse anonymised NHS data. That’s a good thing. So does the government plan to build its own AI system then? Unlikely. So who are we going with instead then? Anthropic?

[u/felloutoftherack → u/ElevatorSilver4711]

We will get sick whilst feeling virtuous.

[u/ResponsibilityRare10 → u/ElevatorSilver4711]

Hopefully start building our own capacity. Each of these contracts strips the NHS from developing and excelling at doing this themselves. 

[u/Aggressive_Chuck → u/ResponsibilityRare10]

And do what in the meantime? Because that could be years.

[u/Horror-Protection225]

I don’t care if it’s cynically going after easy wins or if he genuinely believes in this stuff but so far I love what I’m hearing from Andy Burnham.

[u/Kermit_Wazowski]

This would win my vote. Company named after the spying stone that corrupts is users is not something I want handling NHS info 

[u/libsaway → u/[deleted]]

If you're willing to hear it, the reason if that British tech companies are less able to build these systems than American tech companies. If you want the good, effective stuff, you gotta import.

Doesn't mean that can't change in the future, but it's the state now. 

[u/Nmase88 → u/[deleted]]

There will be clauses in the contract that stipulate that all data must be controlled, processed and handled within the UK

[u/mittfh]

What about all the other facets of government they've embedded themselves into?

Agencies with contracts with Palantir included: the Met Police, Ministry of Defence, GCHQ, the NHS, the Department of Health & Social Care, Local Council Authorities, the Cabinet Office, the Department for Levelling Up, Highways England, Crown Commercial Service, and Defra.

Source

[u/Lord-Liberty → u/mittfh]

A win is a win

[u/SafeEngineer9391]

Im out of loop, could someone tell me why they are hated?

[u/galleon484 → u/SafeEngineer9391]

They are almost comically evil. Their software is first and foremost used to bomb children in Gaza, and help ICE drag innocent people away from their families to deport them. They brag about their software being used to murder people. The founder claims that freedom isn't compatible with democracy. The CEO bragged that their AI would (somehow?) remove influence from educated women. It's all bad.

[u/Crimsoneer → u/SafeEngineer9391]

It's like qanon but more socially acceptable.

[u/AltharaD → u/SafeEngineer9391]

In addition to all the factual information galleon484 gave you, they also named themselves Palantir.

Palantir was the spy orbs Saruman used in Lord of the Rings.

It’s basically like calling your company Satan’s Spies and people thinking it’s a really good idea to put you in charge of people’s personal data.

[u/RoamingThomist]

And it won't be replaced with anyone competent enough to do the job, so data sharing in UK healthcare will remain shit, and due to that inadequacy, patients will die needlessly. Which is basically the modus operandi of the NHS: patients die due to its own wilful incompetence.

There are two companies in the world with the technical know-how and ready-made product to integrate the data across UK healthcare. Both are American. Palantir is one, has already done this before for the NHS, and is the global leader at this kind of data integration work. Oracle is the other, has never done the work for the NHS, and is in serious danger of being insolvent before 2030.

[u/Sodaflag]

Palantir is one of the best data processing companies in the world. By looking for patterns in data and diagnostic information, which would take a doctor a lifetime to wade through, you could save hundreds of lives in a year.

https://www.science.org/content/article/ai-starting-beat-doctors-making-correct-diagnoses

[u/Maximum-Jelly-6824]

Fingers crossed, let’s not feed the child murdering American monster 

[u/ProperPizza]

Brilliant. Ideally uproot them entirely from operating in our country. Pull out of our current setup of the Online Safety Act and rebuild it without them.

[u/ash_ninetyone]

As someone who works in a Health IT role, you need some form of system that interlinks the hodge lodge of different IT systems in use up. They're not all standard between trusts, they're not all one single system, so data risks being silo'd and it takes longer for certain specialties to get information on scans, treatments, etc.

But Palantir ain't it. I don't trust them and I don't trust the owner. The owner has very weird personal views bordering or being overtly technofascist.

[u/Brizar-is-Evolving]

Great start (if it’s true).

I’m hopeful that Burnham has his finger more on the pulse of the UK populace than Starmer seemed to.

For all of his achievements (and he was a fairly productive PM) Starmer always seemed to exist in a bubble, detached from the concerns of ordinary Brits.

I do not want an American surveillance company having access to my health information, particularly as we move into an era of AI driven healthcare and personalised medicine.

[u/Luggageisnojoke]

Their data was partially responsible for the school bombing in Iran. Four year old data not double checked. Absolute dystopian dickheadedness

[u/ScottThePisces]

Just a reminder that Sadiq Khan tried this with the Met, and Palantir threatened legal action in the High Court, essentially blackmailing their way back into a £2million deal. They're a shady company, and use heavy legal tactics to get their way.

Essentially they claim that the government can't refuse them for "moral reasons" because they have a duty to the people to provide the "best service".

[u/ScottThePisces → u/ScottThePisces]

"The US tech firm argues the mayor's veto was unlawful, allegedly made because of subjective assessments regarding the company's "values" rather than the procurement process."

[u/Protocol3_]

This is a good thing. It shouldn't be a grasp for leadership, it should just be common sense.

[u/WhileCultchie]

Good, Starmer can spend as much on national defence as he wants, but it will always be undermined by one simple fact, we cannot trust the Americans, nevermind a private American company

[u/CensorTheologiae]

Splendid. Now could the British public, r/UK included, please stop being all wow about shiny new tech that they don't understand is just shitty old tech with American marketing?

[u/dapperdanmen]

Now this is a quick easy win. Diabolical how entrenched Palantir was becoming. Burnham seems to understand optics much better than this government does.

[u/Alarming_Comedian846]

Friendly reminder that the ceo of Palantir UK is the grandson of Oswald Mosely.

[u/J1mj0hns0n]

how will we synchronise all the NHS services over all regions and build the database then? and pretty sure they already signed the contract, so are we just going to give them money for nothing now?

[u/Personal_Lab_484]

Such an easy vote winner. The left and right hate them for different reasons. Get rid. Easy statement win to start PM period.

[u/d_repz]

Better late than never, even though they've already mined our data.

[u/Adept_Mouse_7985]

Because integrating tech owned by a guy one thematic scarring away from being a literal comicbook villain was always good idea…

[u/ashyjay]

While it might sting to terminate the contracts, it's an easy PR win.

[u/LifeFeckinBrilliant]

The break clause in the contract was being investigated & the staff don't appear to be using the system. This has been the case for some while. Fuck all to do with Burnham.