Baroness Bra, a £5m yacht called Lady M... and a new riddle over £200m PPE deal for her ex-business partner
TORY peer Michelle Mone was last night facing fresh questions over her links to a company that landed more than £200million of Government PPE contracts.
The lingerie tycoon – nicknamed Baroness Bra – has previously denied any ‘association’ with PPE Medpro, which last year won lucrative deals to supply the NHS with facemasks and surgical gowns.
But her denials were thrown into doubt last month after it emerged that she had referred the firm as a potential supplier during the pandemic.
PPE Medpro was then entered into a ‘VIP’ high-priority lane for firms with political connections and was awarded two contracts with a total value of £203million.
Now an investigation by The Mail on Sunday can reveal that PPE Medpro’s owner, Anthony Page, is also the director of a firm that owns a luxury yacht on which
‘This further evidence makes a mockery of her denial’
the Glasgow-born peer sailed around the Adriatic last summer.
Lady Mone posted a string of pictures on Instagram of herself on board the £5million yacht, named Lady M, between August 3 and 29.
Records show that the yacht sailed along the Croatian coast that month.
Mr Page, 45, is a wealth-management expert who works for Lady Mone’s husband, Scottish entrepreneur Doug Barrowman. Company records show that Mr Page is also a director of LM Yachts, which in May bought the 127ft yacht which Lady Mone sailed in, changing its name from Mia Cara to Lady M.
Mr Page also attended the wedding of Lady Mone and Mr Barrowman in November 2020.
Angela Rayner, Labour’s Deputy Leader, said last night: ‘These fresh revelations underline how important it is that Baroness Mone is fully investigated.
‘She completely denied any relationship with PPE Medpro, which secured £200million worth of taxpayers’ money on her recommendation. The further evidence uncovered by The Mail on Sunday makes a mockery of that denial.’
PPE Medpro was incorporated in May 2020, two months into the first coronavirus lockdown. Mr Page was named as its 100 per cent shareholder and a director.
He is also a director of Knox House Trust, part of a group of companies founded by Mr Barrowman, and was the company secretary of a firm that manages Baroness Mone’s personal brand. He resigned from that position on the same day that PPE Medpro was incorporated.
On June 12, 2020, PPE Medpro won its first contract – worth almost £81 million – to supply 210million facemasks. Two weeks later it landed a second £122million contract to provide 25million surgical gowns.
According to the Guardian, Baroness Mone’s lawyers repeatedly denied last year that she had any connection or association with PPE Medpro or a role in how it secured the contracts. Her lawyers reportedly claimed she was ‘not connected in any way with PPE Medpro’, adding that ‘any suggestion of an association’ would be ‘both inaccurate and misleading’.
But the Department of Health and Social Care last month revealed that Lady Mone had referred the company to the Government as a potential PPE supplier.
A spokesman for Lady Mone said she ‘is neither an investor, director or shareholder in any way associated with PPE Medpro’, adding: ‘She has never had any role or function in PPE Medpro, nor in the process by which contracts were awarded to PPE Medpro.
‘Baroness Mone had no knowledge of any “high-priority lane”, and did not play any part in or have any knowledge of PPE Medpro being placed in such a lane.’
Asked if Baroness Mone’s earlier denial of any connection with the company was misleading, Mr Page replied: ‘No.’ He added: ‘I am a director of a licensed and regulated trust and corporate service provider. I am in the business of providing professional directorship services and do so to a wide range of companies and clients.’