Elon Musk and Peter Thiel are sinking their corporate claws deep into the UK energy, health, and defence sectors. Why are we surrendering our national sovereignty to Silicon Valley?
A tech-takeover in the UK
Elon Musk has requested an energy licence from Ofgem, via Tesla, which, if approved, will give him direct access to Britain’s energy grid. Peter Thiel’s Palantir is already interwoven into the essential technical infrastructure of the NHS and Ministry of Defence (MoD).
Individually, these moves are very significant, but together, they reveal a potential restructuring of national power in which essential UK systems, from military and hospitals to energy networks, are being operated on platforms owned and controlled by American billionaires with close links to the US political right.
Step by step, Britain is handing parts of its vital operating system to individuals with no direct accountability to its citizens and who have displayed strong ideological motivations behind their business strategies.
Musk’s energy ambitions
Tesla’s plan to become a UK energy supplier is framed as a clean‑tech revolution: solar panels, home batteries, EV charging, smart tariffs, and even the chance for households to sell surplus energy back to the grid.
But Britain’s power grid is not just another consumer marketplace. As with defence and health, it is a critical infrastructure, and Musk’s hands-on management style could concentrate influence over pricing, distribution and resilience in the hands of one politically ambitious billionaire. But the problem runs deeper than that.
If Musk’s bid is accepted, Tesla would be subject to Ofgem regulations. He doesn’t like regulations. He has refused to respect EU regulations, he has ignored France’s request to collaborate on the role of X in foreign interference in domestic politics, and he refused to comply with Brazilian legal requirements to the point that X was shut down until he did.
Could the UK shut down an energy grid if Musk played politics with it? Would he launch an anti-government campaign on X, or simply refuse to comply? He has already attacked Britain’s efforts to regulate social media and suggested that America liberate Britain from a ‘tyrannical government’, yet a few months later, he is asking that same government for access to its energy grid. American ‘liberations’ have often involved a coup d’état followed by the installation of a puppet regime. Is this the first step in a bloodless, corporate coup d’état?
Thiel’s Palantir: a shadowy presence in British institutions
While Musk seeks approval from Ofgem, Peter Thiel’s Palantir already holds the keys to vast swathes of British public life. It’s a £330mn contract with NHS England, which runs the Federated Data Platform, a US‑owned system linking patient and hospital records nationwide. The aim is to smooth referrals and standardise medical records. In practice, it places highly personal data of the British people in the hands of an American company with a history in military surveillance and policing.
Palantir’s footprint also extends into the Ministry of Defence. A £75mn data analytics deal embeds its platform at the heart of military planning, logistics and intelligence. British commanders rely on software engineered in California to inform decisions on deployment and strategy, and many of these contracts were awarded without open tender.
Dependency by design
Musk’s aspirations to enter Britain’s energy market and Thiel’s control of health and defence data share a dangerous trait: they create long‑term structural dependence.
Once an essential system is built using privately patented technology, replacing it becomes cripplingly expensive, technically challenging, and politically fraught. The potential for political leverage to shift from elected representatives in Westminster to corporate boardrooms in California is highly concerning, especially when the commercial players have priorities which are often at odds with what the British public wants. Peter Thiel is opposed to the existence of the NHS, and Musk is highly critical of our elected government. Yet here they are.
The democratic cost
Putin once asked Musk to withhold Starlink provision to Taiwan as a favour to Xi Jinping. Imagine if he asks Musk to withhold our energy provision. Conversely, in moments of crisis, our own strategic responses may depend not simply on the will of the British state, but on the cooperation of a foreign technology firm. Britain keeps the outward appearance of control – parliament, Whitehall, public services – but the ability to act independently and decisively could be increasingly eroded by placing our ability to act into the hands of highly politicised foreign actors. This is sovereignty hollowed out not by force, but by the quiet signing of procurement agreements.
Not anti‑tech – but pro‑control
Rejecting technological advancement is neither realistic nor desirable. The challenge lies in ensuring that the integration of cutting‑edge systems strengthens the country rather than binding it to potentially hostile actors. Britain needs firm control over foreign ownership of its strategic infrastructure, with critical data stored and governed entirely within UK jurisdiction.
It must invest in domestic alternatives to prevent being paralysed in the case of a conflict of interest, and every major public contract should include clear exit strategies so that systems cannot hold the nation hostage. Above all, parliamentary scrutiny should be applied to all high‑value technology partnerships in health, energy, defence and beyond, ensuring that public interest is the guiding principle at every stage. As things currently stand, this is absolutely not the case.
Palantir sees itself as ideologically separated from British doctors, with Thiel claiming the British people have Stockholm Syndrome when it comes to the national affection for the NHS. Several NHS trusts have refused to install the software, and doctors are unaware how the collected data will be used. Despite this, Palantir is tipped to win further contracts in the health sector. It has also been busy lobbying ministers for access to our criminal justice system.
Why it matters now
Musk’s Tesla is seeking entry to the UK’s energy market at a time when energy security, net‑zero targets and the cost‑of‑living crisis are all highly politicised concerns. Thiel’s Palantir is embedding itself further into the NHS and the MoD during a period when public services and the military are both feeling the strain. These companies are moving in precisely where the British state has either neglected investment or failed to develop domestic capability. And once inside, removing them becomes so disruptive that the question of who is really in control shifts uncomfortably to the sidelines.
The longer Britain waits to set firm boundaries and build national capacity, the deeper these dependencies will grow – and the harder they will be to reverse.
The decision point
Peter Thiel’s and potentially Elon Musk’s ventures into British society are not fleeting business experiments; these politically controversial companies are implanting themselves into the internal mechanisms that determine how Britain generates power, protects itself, and cares for its people.
The choice is stark. We can either embrace technological progress on our own terms, with transparency, resilience and sovereignty at its core, or we can drift towards a future in which the levers of national life are held in Silicon Valley boardrooms.
The clock is ticking. And it is not set to GMT.
