Questions over ‘VIP lane’ firm’s £29m payout to Baroness Mone
THE UK Government has been accused of a “total failure of due diligence” after reports that Tory peer Michelle Mone secretly received millions from a firm she helped win lucrative Covid contracts.
According to the Guardian, the Glasgow baroness and her children received £29 million from the profits of PPE Medpro.
Lady Mone is said to have helped the company secure a place in the “VIP lane” used by the government during the pandemic, where they went on to secure contracts worth more than £203m – including £122m worth of gowns which were unusable.
An internal investigation by HSBC – obtained by the paper – reportedly shows a money trail with Ms Mone’s husband, Doug Barrowman, transferring tens of millions in PPE Medpro profits through a network of offshore entities.
The bank’s investigation noted that “large value inter-account transfers” originating from the firm were being routed through the businessman’s offshore accounts.
In September 2020, Mr Barrowman was said to have been paid at least £65m from the deal into an Isle of Man trust.
Transfers were then reportedly made to his personal HSBC bank account.
The following month that account is said to have transferred £28.8m to another entity called the Keristal Trust, which was set up by Mr Barrowman along with another individual linked to PPE Medpro and whose beneficiaries were Lady Mone and her children.
Smaller sums were also passed as “gifts” to employees of Mr
Barrowman’s financial services firm, the Knox Group, it was claimed.
The internal bank report described the money flows as “unusual activity”, noting a concern that Mr Barrowman “may be attempting to conceal the true origins of the funds through multiple layers of transactions, creating a distance between the receipt of PPE funds and the final beneficiaries”.
Referring to Lady Mone, it concluded that the transfers “suggest a UK peer in the House of Lords has benefited from a contract with the UK Government”.
Both the baroness and Mr Barrowman have long denied any involvement in PPE Medpro.
The report was raised in the House of Commons yesterday morning, but Commons Speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle warned MPS that under parliament’s rules they could not criticise the conduct of Lady Mone.
Labour Deputy Leader Angela Rayner hit out at a “total failure of due diligence and a conflict of interest at the heart of government procurement.”
She told MPS: “In May 2020, PPE Medpro was set up and given £203m in government contracts after a referral from a Tory peer.
“It now appears that tens of millions of pounds of that money ended up in offshore accounts connected to the individuals involved, profits made possible through the company’s personal connections to ministers and the Tory’s VIP lane that was declared illegal by the High Court.”
Health Minister Neil O’brien said a “satisfactory agreement” had not been reached with PPE Medpro about its contract.
He told the Commons: “It’s been widely reported that it had an underperforming contract, and let me set out what we do in those cases.
“The first step is to send a letter before action, which outlines a claim for damages. And that is then followed by litigation in the event that a satisfactory agreement has not been reached.
“And as to the honourable lady’s question directly, we haven’t got to the point where a satisfactory agreement has been reached at this stage.”
The SNP’S Brendan O’hara described the VIP lane as a “get-richquick scheme”.
He told MPS: “Fast-tracking the cronies, their politically connected pals, and their colleagues was never going to end well.
“And I suspect that today’s revelations, however shocking, are simply the tip of a very large iceberg, an iceberg which could yet sink this ship of fools.”
The MP added: “Now that we have one Tory politician, who has absolutely no background in PPE procurement, personally making millions out of these contracts can I ask, does the government plan to proactively investigate how many others there are like this in their ranks or are they content to sit there and watch this dripping roast of sleaze, corruption and scandal unfold on its own?”
Lady Mone took to Twitter yesterday, sharing a picture with the words: “Don’t believe everything you read or everything you think.”
I suspect that today’s revelations, however shocking, are simply the tip of a very large iceberg