The UK government is putting its most politically charged health-tech contract on formal notice.
Technology minister Liz Kendall confirmed this week that the current health secretary is reviewing "every single aspect" of the £330 million NHS deal with Palantir, the American data analytics company. The contract includes a break clause the government could trigger in 2027, and officials are now openly weighing whether to use it. Kendall made the confirmation in comments to Times Radio, framing the review as part of a broader scrutiny of health spending.
A formal review of a live, operational government contract is unusual - it suggests the political cost of the arrangement has become harder to absorb than the operational disruption of unwinding it. The deal has attracted sustained opposition from privacy advocates and NHS staff since it was signed, and this review is the clearest signal yet that those objections have reached the ministerial level.
Palantir's government contracts have a long history of surviving controversy by outlasting it. The company holds substantial US federal contracts that have faced similar scrutiny and remained intact. Whether this review ends in a genuine exit or a renegotiation engineered to reduce the headlines is the more realistic question.