It's true that the UK public sector could save insane amounts of money by working together better (e.g. 150 NHS trusts should not all be procuring their own systems, but they do - or rather, if they do, they shouldn't be complaining about a lack of money).
It's also true that Palantir should be nowhere near this, both from an infosec perspective and a "why do we keep giving money to US companies?" perspective.
I've thought quite a lot about how to establish key software infrastructure in the UK, particularly regarding EHRs. Has anyone else (Louis Mosley no need to respond)? How do we do it? What challenges/benefits did you spot?
We should not be giving money to these mega corps because that also implies giving them our most personal health data. For sure they'll say that we can trust them — maybe it's even true right now, but that can change on a dime, and I don't want to have no option but to trust a crook with no way to pull our public money and my personal data out.
We do need to make things more efficient. But it's lazy of us tech types to fall for centralisation in its most naive form — centralisation of personal data storage always comes with huge risks. We overstate the benefits, and we're not around to pay the price when the benefits fail to pass and the hidden costs creep out.
Instead, we should be pushing the health record out to individuals, and away from the centre. We should own our own data — perhaps it should even reside on our own device. Our governments should be pushing to store less data, not more.
My favourite anecdote on health service bureaucracy - a few years ago significant other worked for local NHS trust using software A to record all their interactions with service users. Trust decided to migrate to software B, and spent significant time and money migrating data from one to the other.
Mere months later, the service contract is won by the neighbouring trust. Their standard system is, of course, software A!
Migration happened in reverse, but without budget to move historical records back over. Staff were left scrabbling around manually copying data for current cases from one system to the other…
Palantir's goal is to make a data monopoly. This is laid out quite plainly in Peter Thiel's book 0 to 1. As he said: "Competition is for suckers.". This is also pushed internally (I worked for Palantir as an FDE or "delta").
The financial purpose is to create a J curve with income. Lose a bit or money first, then charge monopoly prices.
I don't like Palantir at all. Anecdote: I got drugged without consent _twice_ while employed there. The first time was minor but the second time hurt me and I'm still hurt from it. I can only guess but I think I got dosed with a large amount of Adderal or meth. I quit after that. I wanted to get authorities involved, but Palantir contracted for them, so I didn't out of fear.
This being said, if you're a UK employee and think this is a good idea: you're about to get screwed out of a lot of money long term. And you won't be able to leave because Palantir's tactic is to be as sticky as possible.
My government uses an in-house designed and built self-serve portal for pretty much everything from tax to healthcare etc. Its been around a long time - I remember being impressed with it when scheduling childcare benefits - and its grown in features if not so much in looks.
A government agency employs normal average developers etc.
They offer non-stellar wages in an economical backwater so has quite a boost on the local economy and gives programmers wanting to live more rurally employment opportunities, but I imagine today a lot could be remote too.
And it works great. No thrills but functional. Excellent value for money.
(The uk's gov.uk websites that I've had to interact with have a similar look and feel if a less integrated feeling; I don't know how they are developed.)
I've seen and known the the outsourced contractor systems in normal companies from the big names and all have always been an unending disaster. The goal is to 'grow the engagement' not finish. The incentives that keep it going in normal companies are not really about getting a good system quickly.
The UK's gov.uk is done by the Government Digital Service, which used to be part of the cabinet office. In my view it's one of the great successes of the Cameron ministry (without breaking the rules on politics, I take a dim view of his premiership in general).
They focused a lot on UX. For example, they avoid dropdowns - "the select component should only be used as a last resort in public-facing services because research shows that some users find selects very difficult to use." [Source](https://design-system.service.gov.uk/components/select/).
What country are you from? Is there a link to the agency that maintains the portal? I worked in local government in a unit that was arguing for in-housing developers rather than hiring contractors. That team could maybe learn from your country's experience.
Anytime my (developed and well-educated) country's government tries to build or have built any IT system it ends in disaster. I wish we could have what you have, but at this point I don't trust my government to do anything themselves when it comes to digital.
Given the anti Europe stance expressed in the leaked Signal chat [1] any consideration of embedding Palantir in the fabric of European life is to say the least, foolish.
Palantir don't care about this, they will likely turn it into a massive cluster fuck and charge £2000+ per day person and extract probably billions from the tax payer.
If you ask anyone who has worked for these bastards (I have worked at several similar companies) they NEVER actually do the project correctly and there are a million different reasons why something which should be simple should take a million years.
All of these type of things can be done in the open without Palantir involved at all for next to no money.
Actually, thinking about this for a second, this is a billion dollar AI company - you could probably write a system now that can extract patterns and organise data in internal systems and automatically create a nice API, documentation, how to use it and dashboards etc. without having to do any of the work to change current systems. Anyone want to help me build this?
How would a European government accept any service from a company that has Peter Thiel as a major investor, the guy who funded JD Vance, the current USA VP set to push the propaganda to promote hate and the destruction of the European Institutions, and Russian propaganda?
This is the company, of the guy who sponsored Vance, right? The very same Vance, who already outraged the public. Why is this company not banned already for anti-democratic extremism?
An article about Admiral Rickover appeared here a few days ago, and I think it's apt to quote him in this context: "Complex jobs cannot be accomplished effectively with transients."
I think that is the gov.uk website, not any UK government software.
I think it is quite normal for individual sites to enforce a tech stack for their own site. gov.uk is quite huge - all sorts of things from passport applications, tax returns, car licensing and so on.
My CTO is always talking about Palantir and how they are the future and how we need to figure out how to implement their services into our work.
However, I can't find any examples of what they really do or what kind of product they offer. I've watched multiple videos about Palantir including many interviews with Alex Karp. But I still can't figure out exactly what they do and how their products/services would help us at work.
Seems like a bad idea to involve a corporation with deep ties to tyranny and genocide in medical information systems. I wonder why the politicians are willing to take the risk of a harsh popular response.
[+] [-] robertlagrant|1 year ago|reply
It's also true that Palantir should be nowhere near this, both from an infosec perspective and a "why do we keep giving money to US companies?" perspective.
I've thought quite a lot about how to establish key software infrastructure in the UK, particularly regarding EHRs. Has anyone else (Louis Mosley no need to respond)? How do we do it? What challenges/benefits did you spot?
[+] [-] dent9876543|1 year ago|reply
We do need to make things more efficient. But it's lazy of us tech types to fall for centralisation in its most naive form — centralisation of personal data storage always comes with huge risks. We overstate the benefits, and we're not around to pay the price when the benefits fail to pass and the hidden costs creep out.
Instead, we should be pushing the health record out to individuals, and away from the centre. We should own our own data — perhaps it should even reside on our own device. Our governments should be pushing to store less data, not more.
[+] [-] chckens|1 year ago|reply
Mere months later, the service contract is won by the neighbouring trust. Their standard system is, of course, software A!
Migration happened in reverse, but without budget to move historical records back over. Staff were left scrabbling around manually copying data for current cases from one system to the other…
[+] [-] newsclues|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] linuxftw|1 year ago|reply
What is a US company, and what is the disadvantage for UK people that money is paid to a US company rather than a UK company?
Are you arguing for protectionist tariffs to support local wages?
[+] [-] TriangleEdge|1 year ago|reply
The financial purpose is to create a J curve with income. Lose a bit or money first, then charge monopoly prices.
I don't like Palantir at all. Anecdote: I got drugged without consent _twice_ while employed there. The first time was minor but the second time hurt me and I'm still hurt from it. I can only guess but I think I got dosed with a large amount of Adderal or meth. I quit after that. I wanted to get authorities involved, but Palantir contracted for them, so I didn't out of fear.
This being said, if you're a UK employee and think this is a good idea: you're about to get screwed out of a lot of money long term. And you won't be able to leave because Palantir's tactic is to be as sticky as possible.
[+] [-] unknown|1 year ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] amarcheschi|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] hereaiham|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] willvarfar|1 year ago|reply
A government agency employs normal average developers etc.
They offer non-stellar wages in an economical backwater so has quite a boost on the local economy and gives programmers wanting to live more rurally employment opportunities, but I imagine today a lot could be remote too.
And it works great. No thrills but functional. Excellent value for money.
(The uk's gov.uk websites that I've had to interact with have a similar look and feel if a less integrated feeling; I don't know how they are developed.)
I've seen and known the the outsourced contractor systems in normal companies from the big names and all have always been an unending disaster. The goal is to 'grow the engagement' not finish. The incentives that keep it going in normal companies are not really about getting a good system quickly.
[+] [-] verbify|1 year ago|reply
They focused a lot on UX. For example, they avoid dropdowns - "the select component should only be used as a last resort in public-facing services because research shows that some users find selects very difficult to use." [Source](https://design-system.service.gov.uk/components/select/).
It's worth reading their design principles: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/government-design-principles
[+] [-] scrappyjoe|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] somedude895|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] dizhn|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] sorokod|1 year ago|reply
[1] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/mar/25/stunning-signa...
[+] [-] wngr|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] andy_ppp|1 year ago|reply
If you ask anyone who has worked for these bastards (I have worked at several similar companies) they NEVER actually do the project correctly and there are a million different reasons why something which should be simple should take a million years.
All of these type of things can be done in the open without Palantir involved at all for next to no money.
[+] [-] andy_ppp|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] libertine|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] jillyboel|1 year ago|reply
There's also the fact that most people in leadership are not great with IT and appear to be easily sold to.
[+] [-] Zigurd|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] trallnag|1 year ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] owenthejumper|1 year ago|reply
I wonder if Palantir is over shooting here. The European (and UK) nations are clearly reconsidering any investments with US companies.
[+] [-] shortrounddev2|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] PicassoCTs|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] hbrav|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] dtquad|1 year ago|reply
https://docs.publishing.service.gov.uk/manual/conventions-fo...
Are there other examples of governments mandating the use of specific technologies?
[+] [-] mattlondon|1 year ago|reply
I think it is quite normal for individual sites to enforce a tech stack for their own site. gov.uk is quite huge - all sorts of things from passport applications, tax returns, car licensing and so on.
[+] [-] poisonwomb|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] seper8|1 year ago|reply
Just check out their website and let me know if you feel the same...
[+] [-] hollywood_court|1 year ago|reply
However, I can't find any examples of what they really do or what kind of product they offer. I've watched multiple videos about Palantir including many interviews with Alex Karp. But I still can't figure out exactly what they do and how their products/services would help us at work.
[+] [-] unknown|1 year ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] cess11|1 year ago|reply