Protests were held in Ipswich on Saturday against the renewal of a US technology company's £330million contract with the NHS.
Suffolk Norfolk against Palantir took to the Cornhill on Saturday from 11am demanding that the government scraps the data company which became controversial for its support of the Israeli military and the US immigration enforcement agency (ICE).
Organisers stated they were met with an 'overwhelmingly positive' response from the public as they protested.
Organiser Anthony Dooley said: "The turnout of activists distributing leaflets to the general public today relating to our campaign to persuade the government to scrap the contract Palantir has with the NHS, as well as the overwhelmingly positive response from the public was beyond my expectations"
Mr Dooley added that to conclude the event there were speeches and contributions 'most inspiringly' from Eileen, an IT health worker and member of Unison and from the poet, Amy Wragg, who wrote specifically for the event.
In 2023, Palantir was awarded a £330million contract to construct a new data platform for the NHS, the Federated Data Platform, with the contract up for renewal in February 2027.
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Following Sir Keir Starmer's resignation as Prime Minister, Andy Burnham - who is favourite to succeed him - reportedly wants to scrap Palantir's NHS contract.
Mr Dooley said: "We need to step up our campaign to ensure that by the end of the year when the decision is taken that speculation is turned into a reality".
What is Palantir and why is it controversial?
Palantir is a US data company that has major contracts in both the US and UK, with one of the founders Peter Thiel, a stakeholder in Facebook/Meta and personal backer of US Vice-President JD Vance.
Originally set up in 2003, in recent years Palantir has come under scrutiny due to its close ties to the second Trump administration and the forceful raids conducted by ICE.
Amnesty International has objected to the company's technology being used by the Israeli military in what they describe as a genocide in Gaza.
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