Palantir has hired more than 30 senior UK Government officials

ua709

Only 30? Those guys need to get their act together. https://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-aerospace/congr...

stuaxo

“Not only do we entirely reject claims of an alleged ‘revolving door’ strategy, but we also believe it is inappropriate to include veterans in a report alleging such a strategy. Aside from the immense value of their experience, there is rightly an undertaking by government and society to ensure they are afforded the opportunity to build a career outside the armed forces when the time is right for them. Characterising this as part of a ‘revolving door strategy’ does them, and all veterans, a disservice.” Why should people who been in the army be exempt when talking about a company in defence ?

nxobject

I really do love the American "but the veterans!" script, despite only them being a minority of the people involved: > Of [the 32], 14 no longer work for, or with, us, some of whom stopped as long as five years ago. Six are ex-armed forces veterans whose public sector experience involved serving and protecting their country. > Not only do we entirely reject claims of an alleged ‘revolving door’ strategy, but we also believe it is inappropriate to include veterans in a report alleging such a strategy. Aside from the immense value of their experience, there is rightly an undertaking by government and society to ensure they are afforded the opportunity to build a career outside the armed forces when the time is right for them.

nayroclade

Lol, this is SOP for the British state. There has been a revolving door between the civil service and the private sector for decades. You cannot conceive of how many billions have been wasted on "consultancy" contracts with the big four, IT projects that lasted for years and delivered nothing, etc.

karim79

A friend of mine recently got headhunted by a "defense" company called, and I won't even post the link, it's a website which sounds a bit like Van Helsing with some AI thrown in as a twist. He got an offer of 50k EUR more than his current already ridiculous salary. I had to say that it's up to you, but don't expect me to still be your friend and still talk to you if you go for that. "defense"

bpodgursky

This is outrageous. We need to hold the line — nobody who has held a job with the UK Government ever deserves to be employed by the private sector. Once you're in the government, you've made your choice, you live or die in the public sector. No more begging the private sector for mercy later.

notepad0x90

These people are like a plague. Is there nowhere one can escape them? Is everyone aware of all the unhinged beliefs their CEO and leadership has been spreading. never mind their actual practices. https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2026/apr/21/palantir-... I guess like Americans, Britons also have forgotten all of those who paid by their blood to keep destroy these sort of people. Just like Americans, a large number of people know this is a crazy deal, but not enough to do something about it.

phatfish

They also hired the eldest grandson of the most famous British fascist (Oswald Mosley) to be head of the UK division. No idea what the grandsons politics are like, and the guy has to work somewhere. But, you get the feeling mentioning his famous grandfather in the interview was ticking a lot of boxes for this gig.

cryo32

The "revolving door" spoken of here isn't quite as simple as it looks. Granted there are problems at "senior government level" but that is rare . I worked for UK government for a few years. Then I went to the private sector. This happens a lot. Most of people who do, me included, it's because the public sector is so deep in incompetence and stupid politics that it is soul-crushing. Also to get anywhere you tend to have to take placement roles andmove around a lot and resort to a lot of arse licking and back-stabbing. Having a family or any stability is really difficult. So you leave. And then they attempt to get you back with "enhanced pay" over your initial mediocre salary because there is suddenly a skills vacuum and everything is falling apart. They know who to reach out to because they want people who can slide back in and clean up the mess. All with redundancy again waved around constantly due to government reshuffles.

jimz

The problem with the article cited as the source is that it's unclear as to how many are former public servants or serving ones. Of course, Peers hold their seat in the Lords by virtue of appointment and title, and unless they quit, the implication is that at least some of these are basically side gigs and hence, not a revolving door (that would be how regulatory capture happens in the US and the mere fact that one can straight up a member of the Upper House, however broadly powerless it nowadays, is frankly, asking for the appearance of impropriety). Also 18 people still work there and the PR firm might have screwed up by making a statement that needlessly bring up the question of whether those who no longer work for companies and the veterans mentioned overlap in part or whole. The list of names don't add up to to 30, but 26. But it'd be really helpful if this obvious moral hazard is explicitly enumerated in the law somehow. Look, the Commons runs the country, and the PM can't violate the constitution (not that there is one and I don't think it's a coincidence that countries have tended to write theirs down, apologies of Bagehot). Why does the Lords still exist when they are basically a rump branch anyway? If the lower house can simply legislate every aspect of it, it's a liability and not that great of a look from afar, whether some sort of influence peddling actually occurred or not. In the US the standard is appearance of impropriety in addition to actual bias and conflict of interest (as in, more than appearance) because this kind of relationship erodes public trust. At some point, it can't be worth the potential PR problem to keep around a rump branch of the government. There's almost 1000 years worth of sunk cost so gotta know when to let go. Are the OBEs and CBEs and all that honours list stuff not good enough? I'm with David Bowie on this one.

nixass

And people still voting ReformUK while seeing what's happening across the pond with equally idiotic people who are in charge for last ~18 months + 4 years in their first term. Looks like they need to learn on their own skin

Havoc

UK gov really needs to get a grip. When they're not legislating dystopian privacy invading rules they're voluntarily hand over citizen medical data or letting shit like this fly.