In August 2025, Coventry City Council became the first UK local authority to sign with Palantir Technologies, committing £500,000 annually for AI in social work and children's services.
We live in a world where private companies routinely assist authorities with national databases, facial recognition, and algorithmic citizen assessments. Cynics may suggest that we all have an SVL calculated to the nearest penny by government algorithms. The Coventry deal simply makes visible what's been happening quietly across sectors for years.
Coventry's contract follows a pilot using AI for case-note transcription and summarising social workers' records. The system now screens applications for household support funds and will expand to special educational needs processes. But this local implementation is part of something much larger.
Palantir already provides AI to tackle organised crime in Leicestershire and built the NHS Federated Data Platform through a £330 million, seven-year contract awarded in 2023. The platform aims to become the UK's largest single point of healthcare data access, centralising patient information across the entire system.
The NHS historically operates with information held in disconnected systems, creating staff burdens and patient care delays. Palantir's Foundry software combines data like patient conditions, pre-operative assessments, and doctor availability to book patients directly into available slots. Early results show North Cumbria performing 10% more surgeries, Croydon achieving 12% higher theatre utilization, and North Tees reducing long stays by 36%.
Critics highlight Palantir's background, previous customers, military and surveillance use.
Yet this controversy often misses the fundamental point. We're witnessing governance evolution in the digital age, whether we like it or not. Whether governments lean left or right, they increasingly hunger for data-driven control, statistical insights, and algorithmic efficiency to feed modern administration.
By integrating proprietary Foundry software into NHS core systems, Palantir gains unprecedented healthcare infrastructure influence. The NHS might become increasingly reliant on their platform, potentially constraining future adaptations. The New York Police Department experienced data retrieval difficulties after ending its Palantir relationship, illustrating deep technological entanglement risks.
The Palantir-NHS partnership demonstrates both practical benefits and governance challenges when powerful technology companies become integral to public services. This isn't necessarily about corporate overreach or democratic erosion - it's adaptation to a world where statistical analysis and algorithmic prediction have become fundamental to government operation.
The challenge isn't resisting this transformation, which appears inevitable and theoretically beneficial, but shaping it to maintain public accountability and citizen agency. Success requires transparent oversight, robust accountability measures, and preserving space for human discretion and democratic input.