Recent lobbyist for Palantir had key role in helping Andy Burnham become PM

A recent lobbyist for the controversial $450 billion US tech company Palantir played a senior role in helping Andy Burnham become prime minister, it has emerged. Martha Dalton, whose company Lodestone worked for Palantir in 2024 and 2025, campaigned for Burnham in the Makerfield byelection that secured his return to parliament. She worked closely with his team on strategic communications and rebuttals, and was among supporters who clapped him into Downing Street in July.

Lodestone, which Dalton co-founded, worked for Palantir on projects including promoting its software at events in parliament where its engineers demonstrated AI-powered systems for use in British public services to MPs. Dalton previously worked on the autumn 2025 deputy leadership campaign for the current education secretary, Lucy Powell, a few months after Lodestone stopped working for Palantir.

Her role emerged as Palantir fights to retain its £330 million contract with NHS England to run the federated data platform, a national medical data system. Burnham’s government is under pressure to scrap the deal.

Campaigners are angry about Palantir’s work for the Israeli military in Gaza and Donald Trump’s ICE immigration crackdown. They have also raised concerns, acknowledged by NHS England’s chief executive, Jim Mackey, that the benefits to public health may not be as significant as has been claimed.