Palantir vs the Progressives

Britain’s progressive establishment, the type of people who voted Green in the local elections and would rather go on holiday in North Korea than Israel, have a new bogeyman: the US tech firm Palantir. Palantir has everything they want in an antagonist: Big Tech, tick; American, tick; one of its founders is Peter Thiel, tick; works with the US military, border patrol and immigration enforcement, tick. For progressives the fact that Palantir has grown to be a success is not a reflection of the hard work of its staff or the charismatic leadership of its CEO, Alex Karp, but rather proof of its innate wickedness.

The comedic element of this dispute is that the focus of progressive anger in the UK is the National Health Service’s Federated Data Platform (FDP). Palantir works with the US, British and even Israeli military, and this is what really upsets the progressives, but it is easier for them to focus their attacks on the NHS, which has a contract with Palantir to provide the FDP.  Only in Britain would a health-related software tool become a life and death struggle for progressives. In cinematic terms: instead of Hollywood’s  Dr Strangelove, we get the Great British Carry On Up the Data Platform.

After offering its services, for a nominal £1, to the NHS during the pandemic, Palantir and its partners won the FDP contract awarded by the NHS in late 2023. The FDP’s purpose is to link up the vast quantity of data that the NHS generates, from hospitals to polyclinics, allowing clinicians to use this information to make better decisions. In a recent debate in the House of Commons — discussing Palantir’s role in the NHS and dominated by ad hominem attacks on Palantir — a Labour minister was forced to report that Palantir’s FDP was doing well and in fact exceeding its performance targets.

One line of attack by progressive activists is that a US tech firm should not have access to NHS patients’ data. The trouble with this argument is that in fact Palantir don’t have access to or control of the data, any more than the manufacturers of CT scanners have access to a patient’s scans. So people arguing this are either mistaken or, for many online, being deliberately mendacious.

The motives of those criticising Palantir range from the principled but extreme, including doctors who object to any private firms being involved in the NHS in any form, to those who are obviously arguing in bad faith. One progressive star to enter the Palantir debate is the Green leader, Zach Polanski.

Polanski, who used to be known as David Paulden, is a former Liberal Democrat activist and former hypnotherapist. He has attacked Palantir’s senior UK executive, Louis Mosley, for daring to have Sir Oswald Mosley, the prewar leader of the British Union of Fascists, as a grandfather. As attacks go that is pretty low even for Polanski. After all, none of us chose our ancestors. It could also be pointed out to Polanski that Mr Mosley’s uncle, Nicholas Mosley, won the Military Cross for bravery in the Second World War.  Yet karma is a wonderful thing, as Polanski then made a fool of himself by claiming that Peter Thiel was the CEO of Palantir, rather than Alex Karp. It might have been wise for Polanski to get his basic facts right before wading into the debate, but that might have involved him doing some research before running off to the media.

Another progressive outfit that is making itself heard is the lawyer Joylon Maugham’s Good Law Project, which is doing a multiple part podcast on Palantir’s involvement with the NHS, with the sinister sounding title “The Shadow Contract”.

The truth is that there is no argument or action by Palantir, Alex Karp or Louis Mosley  would appease Polanski, Maugham or the Guardian editorial writers. Their opposition to Palantir is a quasi-religious act of faith, proving how enlightened and superior progressives are over the rest of humanity.

Most ordinary British people, of course, don’t care about this debate. The vast majority want an NHS that works and anything that makes the NHS works better is to be welcomed. If the provider is Palantir, no-one, outside certain circles in places like Islington or Brighton, really cares. On the wider issue of Palantir and defence capabilities, the majority of voters want the West in general and the UK in particular to have high tech defence capabilities in our new, more dangerous age.

Unlike many of the wealthier progressive voices making themselves heard, most British people don’t have the  resources to afford private healthcare. So they depend on the NHS if they fall sick, and want it and its hardworking staff to have the best tools they can to do the job. If that requires US tech companies to provide software, so be it. I hope common sense prevails and Palantir’s provision of the Federated Data Platform is judged on its operational merits and cost, not on ideological attacks unrelated to the NHS.

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