Michelle Mone: Who is she and what is the PPE controversy swirling around the Tory peer?
Baroness Michelle Mone says the public perception of her is of a “horrible person, a liar, a cheat and a thief” due to a controversial PPE deal during the pandemic.
But who is the Tory peer, what was so controversial about the PPE contracts and why is she back in the spotlight? Here’s everything you need to know.
Who is Baroness Mone?
The 52-year-old is a businesswoman and the founder of lingerie company Ultimo.
Born in Glasgow, she left school with no qualifications at 15 and went on to launch ventures in diet pills, fake tan and cryptocurrency. She became a Conservative life peer in 2015.
What is the PPE controversy?
The row around PPE Medpro started swirling back in 2020, when reporters first began asking questions about Baroness Mone’s apparent links to the company.
In 2021, the government revealed that she had referred PPE Medpro via the VIP lane system, with the company awarded two contracts worth £200m.
Baroness Mone faced allegations that she had profited from the business, a claim she initially denied.
She took a leave of absence from the House of Lords in 2022 as a result, in order to “clear her name of the allegations that have been unjustly levelled against her”.
The contracts are still being investigated by the National Crime Agency (NCA).
What did she say initially?
Baroness Mone consistently denied any “role or function” in the company up until November 2023, with lawyers previously saying she is “not connected to PPE Medpro in any capacity”.
Asked in November 2021 why Baroness Mone did not declare PPE Medpro on her Lords register of interests, her lawyer told the Guardian: “For the avoidance of any doubt, Baroness Mone did not declare any interest as she did not benefit financially and was not connected to PPE Medpro in any capacity.”
Why is she back in the news?
In November 2023, Baroness Mone and her husband, Doug Barrowman, confirmed for the first time they were involved in the company – including that he chaired and led the operation, and put up half the money for PPE Medpro.
Following a silence lasting almost two years, Baroness Mone admitted she regretted denying her connection to the PPE firm’s contracts.
In a YouTube documentary funded by PPE Medpro, she said: “I regret not saying to the press straight away, ‘yes I am involved,'” describing it as an “error”.
She added: “The government knew I was involved and the emergency team, the cabinet team, knew I was involved – the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC), knew I was involved, the NHS – all of them.
“The legal team advised myself and my husband not to comment and not to say of my involvement in PPE Medpro.”
Baroness Mone said she was a “conduit” and a “liaison person” who “brought it all together”, but ultimately denied any wrongdoing.
“I wanted the NHS to succeed, I wanted a win-win situation for everyone,” she said.
“Both myself and my husband declared their interests and if they had any issue with that whatsoever, when they knew of my involvement and my husband’s involvement, why did they ever give the contracts in the first place?
“They must have been satisfied – they knew everything.”
Baroness Mone and her husband decided to speak out, she said, because they are “sick and tired of reading all the lies every single day in the media”.
Asked how it would end, she said: “We will win, because we’ve done nothing wrong, and it’s cruel, and it’s nasty, but we will win.”
£60m of profit
A week after her initial admission of regrets, Baroness Mone revealed that she stands to benefit from the PPE contracts.
In an appearance on the BBC’s Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg programme, she said she is a beneficiary of her husband Doug Barrowman’s financial trusts, which hold around £60m of profit from the deal, but said the couple have been made “scapegoats” for the government’s wider failings over PPE.
“If one day, if God forbid, my husband passes away before me, then I am a beneficiary, as well as his children and my children, so yes, of course,” she said.
How did the PPE contract system work?
The VIP lane system saw a separate mailbox set up for MPs to send on offers from firms, but led to the government being criticised for giving preferential treatment to companies with political contacts.
What investigations are under way?
The National Crime Agency is investigating PPE Medpro, while the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) has since issued breach of contract proceedings over a 2020 deal on the supply of gowns.
What was the problem with the PPE?
The 25 million gowns were rejected after a technical inspection, and have never been used in the NHS.
The gowns were required to meet the British Standard for the sterilisation of medical devices or a “technical equivalent”.
PPE Medpro followed the second route, the Guardian reported, which required the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) to seek approval from the health regulator, the MHRA, for them to be used in the NHS. They were not approved.
The company has denied that the kit was faulty.
A spokesperson for the Department of Health and Social Care said: “Due diligence was carried out on all companies that were referred to the department and every company was subjected to the same checks.
“We acted swiftly to procure PPE at the height of the pandemic, competing in an overheated global market where demand massively outstripped supply.”
They added the department was “currently engaged in a mediation process with PPE Medpro”, so could not comment on the specifics of the contract.
Gove under pressure – while Tory peer tells Baroness to steer clear
Michael Gove is facing calls to answer questions before MPs over PPE Medpro after the minister was name-checked by Baroness Mone in her latest interview.
Mr Gove was chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster when the COVID pandemic struck.
Baroness Mone said she contacted Mr Gove at the start of the pandemic following a “call to arms for all Lords, baronesses, MPs, senior civil servants, to help, because they needed massive quantities of PPE”.
“I just said, ‘We can help, and we want to help’. And he was like, ‘Oh my goodness, this is amazing’,” she added.
Shadow cabinet office minister Nick Thomas-Symonds has written to Mr Gove, saying he should answer questions about the so-called “call to arms” and what further communications he had with Baroness Mone.
Meanwhile, energy minister and Tory peer Martin Callanan has urged Baroness Mone to “see sense” and not return to the House of Lords following her leave of absence.
Pressed by Sky News’ Kay Burley on whether someone who had admitted to lying should be allowed back into parliament, Lord Callanan said: “I would hope that she would see sense.”
The minister added: “It is a matter for her to decide… [but] I would hope she would not be coming back to the House of Lords.”