A senior Conservative shadow minister has called for Baroness Michelle Mone to resign from the House of Lords after a company linked to the peer was ordered to repay almost £122 million to the government for breaching a contract to supply surgical gowns during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Shadow energy secretary Claire Coutinho said her behaviour was “disgraceful”, saying the “honourable thing to do” would be to resign.
It came as immigration minister Mike Tapp called for Ms Mone to “consider her position”. But he suggested the government would not take steps to remove her.
The Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) sued PPE Medpro at the High Court, claiming the company had breached the deal because the 25 million gowns it provided were “faulty” by not being sterile.
The company, a consortium led by Lady Mone’s husband, businessman Doug Barrowman, was awarded government contracts by the former Conservative administration to supply PPE during the pandemic, after she recommended it to ministers.
She then acted as the firm’s “big gun” in talks with officials to help get the contract over the line, High Court judge Mrs Justice Cockerill said on Wednesday.
In her 87-page ruling, Mrs Justice Cockerill said the gowns “were not, contractually speaking, sterile, or properly validated as being sterile” which meant they could not be used in the NHS.
Baroness Mone has previously accused the government of pursuing a “vendetta” against her, comments which chancellor Rachel Reeves agreed with, telling the Labour Party conference in Liverpool: “Too right we are”.
But in a letter to the prime minister, seen by Sky News, Ms Mone said: “The chancellor’s deliberate use of the term ‘vendetta’, a word connoting vengeance, feud and blood feud, is incendiary and has directly increased the risks to my personal safety…. My family and I now live with a heightened and genuine fear of appearing in public.”
She also accused Ms Reeves and health secretary Wes Streeting of “falsehoods” in demanding that she hand back £122m, saying she was never a director of PPE Medpro and “never received a penny from it personally.”
Asked if Baroness Mone would step down from the Lords, a spokesman told Sky News: “Those calling for Baroness Mone’s resignation from the House of Lords would be well advised to read the open letter sent this morning to the prime minister, which sets out how this has now become a personal attack and vendetta, politically motivated with loss of all balance and objectivity.”
Ms Coutinho said: “I think it was disgraceful what she’s done. It was also a Conservative government who started the lawsuit. The lawsuit, which means that she’s had to repay this money, started in, I think it was 2022, when Rishi Sunak was prime minister…
“We’ve taken away the Conservative whip, she’s no longer a Conservative peer, and I think the honourable thing to do, particularly in light of this, would be to resign.”
Baroness Mone is currently on a leave of absence from the Lords.
Mr Tapp added: “What we’ve seen with this PPE scandal is the current government made a commitment to getting back that money. We’ve already had two 80 million. This is a further 120, 2 million. That’s really important to the British people who are scammed here.
“When it comes to the Baroness, it’s up to her to consider her position there.”
Asked whether the government would seek to remove Baroness Mone, he said: “Well, it would take an Act of Parliament to do that, and my advice to Baroness Mone is to consider that position.”
He added: “If I was Michelle with that sort of scandal, I’d be considering my position.”
The ruling was celebrated by ministers, including health secretary Wes Streeting, who said the government was “coming after every penny owed to our NHS” as part of a plan to claw back money lost during the pandemic.
Families bereaved in the pandemic also welcomed the judgement and called for Baroness Mone to be stripped of her peerage.
But Baroness Mone said the ruling was a win for the “establishment”, while Mr Barrowman said it was a “travesty of justice”.
Both denied wrongdoing and neither gave evidence at the trial in June, while lawyers for the DHSC said they were “not concerned with any profits made by anybody” and that the case was “simply about compliance”.
The government is now recovering the cost of the £121m contract, as well as the costs of transporting and storing the items, which amount to an additional £8.6m.
