Controversial Spy-Tech Firm’s Inclusion at NHS Confederation Expo Leads to Speaker Pulling Out

Palantir Technologies, the controversial US spy-tech firm, is once again set to be a sponsor of this year’s NHS Confederation Expo, an event jointly delivered with NHS England.

The company, co-founded by Peter Thiel, will have a stall there, as well as sponsoring a main stage panel event titled, ‘The healthcare data revolution: building a system fit for the future with the NHS FDP’. It also sponsored the event in 2024.

The NHS Confederation (Confed) is an independent charity and membership group for organisations that commission and provide NHS services, aimed at bringing together, supporting, and speaking for the whole of the healthcare system in England, Wales, and Northern Ireland.  

The move has caused unease among Confed members and NHS staff, who have raised it with Confed leadership, citing ethical concerns about Palantir’s association with the Trump administration, its ongoing backing of Israel’s military operations in Gaza, and the company’s history in defence tech.

Internal company messages reported by 404 Media show that Palantir’s role in the US’ immigration system has expanded to include tracking down people marked for deportation. 

Concerns have also been raised privately to Byline Times about the Federated Data Platform (FDP) contract — the £330 million consortium deal to organise health data held in NHS trusts, with Palantir as the lead supplier — Palantir’s apparent favoured status in its award, and the possibility of it being a precursor to privatisation by the UK Government. 

An internal Email confirming Palantir’s inclusion as ‘a sponsor at ConfedExpo this year’, sent to all staff by the Group Executive and seen by Byline Times, notes the concerns raised but states that, due to the partnered nature of the event, Confed “do not have unilateral say on who we work with in this regard”. 

The Email states, “the FDP will be a key part of the program at the event and NHS England are satisfied that Palantir is an appropriate sponsor”. It notes that while Confed knows “many colleagues will have concerns about this, that this is the only project the Confed will be working with Palantir on” and that “given most of our members are now working with Palantir, through the FDP, we don’t have grounds to not have them at the event”.

“Ultimately, the decision regarding NHS ConfedExpo is not ours to take alone,” the email reads, and while staff have “commented in the past about how Palantir fits with our ethical framework. The framework is not an ethics algorithm that provides a yes or no answer —sadly there is no such thing.”

The decision to include the company as a sponsor again, has caused a coordinator of the Confederation BME Leadership Network (not directly employed by the Confederation, but contracted to do networking for it, working closely with staff), to pull out of speaking at the Expo. 

Speaking in a personal capacity, coordinator Wayne Farah told Byline Times that “a number of us raised objections”, and that in his view the Confed “should not be working with these people… I was supposed to be speaking at the event, so I’ve withdrawn. I made it clear I wasn’t prepared to do anything that involved them.”

Farah added that for him, “the Confederation as a charity, has a responsibility in terms of its ethical contracting… I’m coordinating black leaders in the Confederation, who [the Confederation] are in bed with Palantir. Why would I want any black people involved with this organisation?”. He went on to cite how it was “giving data to ICE, to the IDF, all these things…”, and how that fails to “align with the fundamental principles of the NHS. It’s like ‘no, we don’t do this. This is not what we’re about, making our patients vulnerable’.”

Palantir’s longstanding involvement with US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has been recently reported as having taken a heightened role under the new Trump administration, with the company building tools to track the location of people marked under the administration’s mass deportation program. 

The company is also reportedly supplying Israel with new AI tools to aid in Israel’s war in Gaza. Speaking in an interview in Tel Aviv, Palantir CEO Alex Karp said that “our products have been in great demand”.

Farah noted a hypocrisy in the Confed’s partnership with Palantir, stating: “They’re kind of debating, ‘should we be on X’, and then turning around and sitting down with the likes of Palantir, which are just as bad. If you’ve got to choose between Musk and [Peter] Thiel (Palantir’s co-founder and chairman), there’s no difference.”

Other Confed members, who declined to come forward publicly for fear of reprisals from management, in statements seen by Byline Times, stated that “for many, staff participation in the expo is a critical development opportunity, which they will now only be able to access if they compromise on their principles and commitment to equality. 

“This is especially the case for BME and particularly Muslim staff who face being retraumatised given Palantir’s links to the genocide.”

For some, the perceived failure of management to consult adequately with staff has been seen “as further evidence of the organisation’s failure to walk the talk on antiracism and the wider equalities agenda”. 

Speaking to Byline Times, also under condition of anonymity and in a personal capacity, one NHS board member agreed with the assessment of others, saying that Palantir’s inclusion “damages the reputation of the Confed. It is meant to be representative and protective of the partners within the Confederation.

“I think when you take such a bold step to have a partner that so many people have concerns about, then I think that undermines the reputation of the judgement and the independence of the Confederation.”

They went on to say that, “If you look within the Confederation, there are a number of different bodies that are a focal point, if you like, for the NHS around things like women’s leadership, around diversity, around the BME leadership, so there’s a lot of good that the Confederation does that is about the culture within the NHS and supporting that.

“It has a reputation for being a strong, independent voice that will say what needs to be said. And then when you suddenly flip that and you get into bed with Palantir, it feels like hang on. You just sold your soul to the devil.

“On one hand, we want to run a session on the double standards and the inability for the NHS to kind of call out genocide, and even in a healthcare context, to talk about it from a humanitarian perspective, because staff feel completely gagged. 

“And the fact that you’ve got an opportunity to at least have a platform to discuss that, and then at the same time, you’ve literally got your main sponsor as being one of the largest companies to benefit from the conflict in that region. The mind boggles.” 

In 2024, campaigners protested against Palantir’s sponsorship of the ConfedExpo, where the company was scheduled to run two sessions. Six protestors were removed from the auditorium by security guards during a session run by the tech giant on ‘improving health outcomes through digital technology’. 

The protests were from the ‘Health Workers for a Free Palestine’, who had targeted the firm over its partnership with the Israeli military and the company’s support for Israel’s actions in Gaza.

In March 2024, Palantir CEO Alex Karp said he was “exceedingly proud that after October 7, within weeks, we are on the ground and we are involved in operationally crucial operations in Israel” and that he company has lost employees and expects to lose more over his public support for Israel.”

The action came amid the ongoing controversy surrounding Palantir’s majority stake in a £330m deal to secure the contracts for the NHS’s new Federated Data Platform (FDP), which is still the subject of contention among NHS staff. 

Given Palantir’s role in sponsoring an event specifically around the FDP, which now sits at the heart of the health service, the board member echoed previous concerns raised by campaigners that the contracting process was not transparent, and could be considered a precursor to privatisation.

They told Byline Times that, “I think when they got a foothold in the NHS during the pandemic and offered to kind of do the data collection and so on, and it was for a token, effectively. But nothing is free.

“It didn’t smell right from the off. It was known right from the start. It was always going to be Palantir and you know, I would say that generally, there’s been pretty much universal pushback across the board, certainly within the digital community. There was a British consortium that got together to try and do something. And in the end I think everyone knew the others were just there for window dressing. It was always a done deal.”

As previously reported by Byline Times, the contracting process lacked transparency from NHS England, and even the language of the agreement seemed to favour Palantir as the frontrunner from the offset. 

The member also raised personal concerns that the award could be “a precursor to privatisation”.

“Because, you know, healthcare is not necessarily profitable, especially if you start to focus on those that are vulnerable and with the greatest needs. So, my fear is that you’ll start to have a model where you’ll be able to cherry pick and understand which services are right for privatisation and so on. So I think for me, this is probably quite a major step in getting away from the universally free healthcare system.” 

Speaking on whether Palantir would sell health data to private interests, Karp told Victoria Derbyshire in 2023: “We’re the only company of our size and scale that doesn’t buy your data, doesn’t sell your data, doesn’t transfer it to any other company. That data belongs to the Government of the United Kingdom.” He added that, “the way our product is set up. I don’t have access to your data. Our product does not allow you to do that.”

When asked whether the data could be sold in the future, he replied: “By the UK Government, not by me.”

A spokesperson for the NHS Confederation said: “NHS ConfedExpo is delivered in partnership by NHS England and the NHS Confederation. Palantir is one of a number of sponsors of the conference. Palantir is a commercial provider of services to the NHS and, in November 2023, a consortium led by Palantir was awarded the contract to deliver the NHS Federated Data Platform.”

Palantir and the NHSE were contacted for comment.