this post was submitted on 10 Jun 2026
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83
Palantir to sue Sadiq Khan over blocked Met police contract (www.cityam.com)
submitted 1 day ago by sanitation@lemmy.today to c/technology@lemmy.world
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[–] MissesAutumnRains@lemmy.blahaj.zone 30 points 1 day ago (2 children)

I'm a bit confused here. Isn't the office of the mayor a political seat? Are they not allowed to make subjective decisions in the course of their duties? How is this grounding for a lawsuit at all?

I know in the US it's a pretty low bar for a lawsuit, but I was under the impression that the UK required some genuine reasoning for going to court.

It just seems insane that an American spy company can sue another country for saying "hey, maybe it's not a good idea to have an American spy company running our police force".

[–] wewbull@feddit.uk 1 points 10 hours ago

They were ousted because the contract was awarded without going through a proper process. The contract was therefore signed by someone without authority. That means it was not a valid contract between Palantir and the Met.

They could conceivably sue the person who signed the contract, but they wouldn't do that as that's their "guy on the inside".

[–] Apocalypteroid@anarchist.nexus 30 points 1 day ago (1 children)

It is very possible and IMO absolutely vital that the government can be taken to court for their decisions in the UK. Government officials and departments should be subject to the same legal scrutiny as individual citizens, if not more so.

Furthermore, Palantir is a multinational company with offices in the UK so it will be the UK arm of Palantir that is taking legal action, so technically a UK company is suing the government, not a US one.

However, IMO they do not have a leg to stand on. The contract was blocked due to a unfair procurement procedure. Palantir was literally the only supplier invited to take part, the procurement process wasn't duly submitted to Mayor's Office, and the Mayor's office has a duty to ensure that the best value has been achieved for the constituents of London. So they are perfectly within the law blocking the contract.

Also, Palantir can fuck off. They're already harvesting NHS data and data from other police forces within the UK and our feckless government is just sittimg on it's hands while sensitive information if being handed to a fascist regime.

[–] MissesAutumnRains@lemmy.blahaj.zone 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I'm not saying they shouldn't be able to be taken to court, more that the argument "making a political decision" literally applies to any action a politician takes. Even if that's not likely to succeed, if that's the bar to clear, any sufficiently large company could just repeatedly sue an official with adversarial views, to hobble any decisions they make couldn't they? This is purely ignorance of how the UK legal system works on my part, so I apologize if this is like super basic info.

That's a good clarification on the UK office of Palantir, though, I fully didn't realize that would be considered a local entity, given where they're headquartered, but it makes way more sense in that case.

[–] Apocalypteroid@anarchist.nexus 2 points 22 hours ago

I completely agree. I doubt Palantir's objective is even to win the case. I imagine the strategy is to cause such a long and expensive process in the hope that the Mayor's office will give in.

I'm no legal expert myself but as way of explaination we have different courts for different matters. As this isn't a criminal case but a civil one of some importance, it would likely go to the 'crown court' and then to the appeals court (should one side decide to appeal) for a final decision, but I believe the appeals process can be very long and drawn out, which is I expect what Palantir want. Because they are cunts.