Speeches by Coleman.

“I think the timescale sounds challenging. If the Government are minded not to continue with the contract after March, would it make sense for them to make that much clearer now in order to give British companies time? Obviously, at the same time as announcing their decision not to extend, they would announce their inte…”

“Realistically speaking, is there any way on God’s earth that we would be able to get other companies into a position to tender and to take over from next March, if we do not make it very clear that that is what is going to happen in the next month or so, and that leaving it to December would be much too late?”

“It was not, so I will ask it again. That wasn’t the question. Forgive me, Minister—and I appreciate that you are doing a terrific job—but that was not the question. The question is: why are you going to wait? Why have you let this independent evaluation run later than the time you have to take the decision on whether t…”

“Are you confident that, if you took the decision in December, you would be able to have a new provider in place by April?”

“I am not disputing that it may be doing those things. Other people may, but I am not disputing that. I am simply asking whether we should not—when it comes to taking forward from next March what happens in the NHS—be looking instead at building Britain’s own sovereign capability in AI in this area.”

“Does it include GP data as well?”

“I am a little concerned that some of the people who may be involved in taking the decision about that may be a little too close to what has happened to date.”

“Palantir may say—I don’t want to put words in Palantir’s mouth, although it is not backward in coming forward with comments generally—that, “Without us, it will not work. You cannot do it, or you cannot do it in the time available”.”

“Yes, but if you are going to do an evaluation, if you are going to procure a big thing—”

“That sounds very helpful. I have a couple more questions related to this. Do you consider that if we had all the time in the world, there are British companies that could provide the range of services that you have just described?”

“I do not think that that is what the Chancellor was talking about when she talked about designating procurement in AI as critical for national security.”

“Thank you all for coming, and congratulations on your new position, Preet. It is great to see you all here. I would like to ask a few questions because, in looking to the future and what happens next, we need to look at the past. Could I look a bit at the procurement of the Palantir contract? My concern is that we have…”

“There is a review taking place, which Imperial College Projects is undertaking. You will have to take a decision. If I am correct, the contract ends unless the Government decide to extend it. We are talking about break clauses, but my understanding is that there is no such thing as a break clause here. We are talking a…”

“The contract will come up for review.”

“Palantir should not assume that it will just get the contract rolled over?”

“Decisions taken about what is done with the data are decisions taken by the people who let the contract. They are not taken by Palantir; they are taken by people in the Department who write a contract and say, “This is what we want, this is what we will allow, this is what we will not allow”. You write the contract, pe…”

“That will be concluded when?”

“If you did wish to continue with the existing contract, fine, but if you decided that you did not wish to continue the existing contract, we have just been hearing that it would require quite a lot of time to get a new tender out, to get other people to procure. Leaving it until December would be a bit late. Do you thi…”

“I have some other questions, but does anyone want to add anything on that just to clarify about the break clause versus choice to extend? No. Thank you. I think we are talking about March next year, but the Minister stated that recently, so we will check it with the Government. We are talking about 90 days’ notice need…”

“The NHS is not a thing. The NHS is made up of people who, from the very top down, take decisions based on the best information available and based on other things. Palantir won the contract. It lowballed and got the contract. This is happening right across the place. It is lowballing, it is giving lots of free advice, …”