Mandelson’s embassy fixed Starmer’s visit to spytech firm

When Keir Starmer went to Washington DC to cosy up to Donald Trump, the next stop on his itinerary was Palantir – just a 10-minute drive from the Oval Office.

But the government can’t tell us what he talked about with Palantir and the British Ambassador, Peter Mandelson, while he was there.

Maybe they discussed Palantir’s work with US agencies accused of separating children from their parents, wrongfully detaining thousands of US citizens and forcibly sterilising women. Perhaps Starmer’s hosts explained why they signed a deal with Benjamin Netanyahu’s government to provide “support for war-related missions” the day after Israel was accused of genocide at the International Criminal Court.

Or maybe the prime minister asked how Palantir’s predictive policing project in LA was cancelled in 2019 after accusations that it entrenched racism and didn’t reduce crime.

We’ll never know. In response to our freedom of information request, the Cabinet Office told us it was only an “informal visit” – a tour of the facilities, a short video presentation and a meet and greet with staff members. So no minutes were kept. 

What the Cabinet Office did tell us is that the visit was organised through the British Embassy in the United States, headed up by Mandelson as the ambassador. But Palantir has worked with Global Counsel, the lobbying firm Mandelson founded in 2016, over many years, and was a client of the firm when the ambassador arranged Starmer’s visit.

Mandelson is no longer Global Counsel’s CEO, but he is both president and chairman of its International Advisory Board. He has also reportedly kept shares in the company – though he has since taken leave from the House of Lords there’s no requirement for him to disclose any details. But it is obviously in Palantir’s, and it is likely in Peter Mandelson’s, financial interests that it gets exclusive face time with the British prime minister.

The secrecy continues at the Foreign Office, who told us they have no record of any emails between the spytech firm and Mandelson’s office. But it’s just the latest example of a wall of silence that surrounds Palantir’s dealings with the public sector in the UK – from the blanked-out £330m contract it has with NHS England to questions surrounding deals with police forces up and down the UK.

“We don’t understand, at all, why Keir Starmer and Wes Streeting are banging the drum for this dangerous spytech firm”, said Good Law Project’s executive director, Jo Maugham. “But Peter Mandelson has a clear conflict of interest – and the failure to keep a minute of the meeting he arranged for the PM shows a kind of contempt for the public interest.”

The British Embassy in the United States and Palantir were both approached for comment.