NHS England pulls list of 137 trusts 'benefiting' from Palantir platform after 29 say they aren't using it

NHS England has removed a webpage listing 137 hospital trusts as "live" with and "realising benefits" from Palantir's Federated Data Platform (FDP). It did so after 29 of those trusts told campaigners they weren't using it, according to the Guardian's reporting on the deletion.

A less detailed page replaced it. It says early users are "already seeing real results – reduced admin, faster patient pathways, and more time for care." NHS England did not respond to requests for comment on the removal.

What the trusts told Medact

The medical campaign group Medact, which wants Palantir out of the NHS, sent more than 100 freedom of information requests to hospitals and integrated care boards across England. Twenty-nine trusts that NHS England counted as benefiting said the system was not live or that they used none of its applications.

That is roughly 21 percent of the 137 listed. NHS England's September figures put 142 trusts as live on the platform.

The responses were specific. University Hospitals of North Midlands said in July: "FDP is not live. We do not intend to roll it out in the future." It added that the platform "does not appear to provide functionality over and above what we have already."

Mersey Care said it had "not yet gone live." Nottingham University Hospitals said "no implementation timeline has been agreed." Epsom and St Helier said it was "not using FDP at the moment."

NHS England's position

NHS England has said its count includes trusts that use the platform's tools for back-office data work rather than patient care. Torbay and South Devon told Medact it is "not currently operationally using the FDP." NHS England still counts it as live because the data-submission systems are in place.

An NHS spokesperson said the platform is "universally available for all NHS trusts and integrated care boards across England," with local organisations free to pick individual tools. The spokesperson said "137 NHS trusts have now reported benefits from the wide range of tools available on the platform."

NHS England's own website says its figures are before-and-after comparisons and that it "cannot draw conclusions about cause and effect" from them.

The operations claim

The list is not the first number in dispute. A Palantir spokesperson said trusts using its software recorded 117,000 additional operations. Palantir also credits the platform with a 12 percent reduction in discharge delays and the removal of 675,000 patients from waiting lists.

The Office for Statistics Regulation has already warned NHS England it has no evidence for the claim that the technology delivered more than 100,000 extra operations. In July the regulator told the health service to be more accurate when quoting figures. The OSR has now said it is examining the "realising benefits" claim too.

The politics and the contract

Palantir won the £330m FDP contract in November 2023, and rollout began in April 2024. The relationship goes back to the pandemic, when the company received contracts worth £60m awarded without competition. Ministers are weighing whether to extend the deal to 2029. The Register reported that the government must decide in December whether to continue it.

Ben Coleman, a Labour member of the Commons health and social care committee, called it "troubling" that NHS England listed the 137 trusts and then "apparently pulled the list when 29 said they weren't using all or most of it." He said: "When NHS England makes claims like this without checking them, it destroys trust." Coleman wants Palantir dropped in favour of an open platform on which trusts and British tech firms can build tools.

Chi Onwurah, chair of the Commons science and technology committee, wants the government to use the 2027 break clause and run an open competition for a UK supplier. "If many NHS trusts don't see the value of the FDP, serious questions need to be asked about whether the hype surrounding Palantir's products matches reality," she said. Unison has also urged ministers not to extend the contract.

Palantir rejects the push to end the deal. Louis Mosley, the company's chief executive for the UK and Europe, said scrapping it would be "putting politics above patients." Palantir has hired the former Labour deputy leader Tom Watson as a lobbyist. In September, 44,000 people objected to the platform.

Some opponents also object to Palantir on political grounds, citing its founder Peter Thiel and its work for the Israeli military and US immigration enforcement. That is separate from the narrower question here: whether a taxpayer-funded contract is being sold on numbers that hold up.

No investigation into the list has been announced. The Office for Statistics Regulation's review of the "realising benefits" claim is the next concrete step. Ministers must decide on the contract before the 2027 break clause comes into play. Onwurah has also pressed the government for details of any exit plan if it ends the deal.