Michelle Mone has accused the government of making her and her husband a “poster couple for the PPE scandal”, in a lengthy online tirade.
The Tory peer claimed the government had turned down multimillion-pound offers to settle a High Court legal battle with a company she is linked with.
PPE Medpro, a consortium led by Baroness Mone’s husband, businessman Doug Barrowman, is being sued by the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) over claims it breached a contract for 25 million surgical gowns during the COVID pandemic.
She had initially denied involvement in the company or the process through which it was handed the government contract.
However, it was later revealed that Baroness Mone was the “source of referral” for the firm getting a place on the so-called “VIP lane” for offers of personal protective equipment for the NHS.
Lawyers for the government previously told a trial that it was entitled to recover the £121m cost of the contract, which the company opposes.
Mrs Justice Cockerill is due to hand down her ruling tomorrow – while court records showed PPE Medpro filed a “notice of appointment to appoint an administrator” on Tuesday.
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And in a post on X on Tuesday, Baroness Mone claimed PPE Medpro offered to replace the gowns before offering a cash sum to settle the case during the trial, which was rejected.
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“Instead, the DHSC chose to spend a staggering £5m of taxpayers’ money pursuing litigation against a company they knew had no funds,” she said.
She said she and Mr Barrowman had “worked tirelessly with the DHSC to resolve this dispute”, and that PPE Medpro had “fulfilled its contracts”.
“This case was never about gowns or money,” she said.
“It has always been about politics and blame-shifting, a way to cover up the government’s disastrous £10bn PPE write-off.
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“Doug and I have been deliberately scapegoated and vilified in an orchestrated campaign designed to distract from catastrophic mismanagement of PPE procurement.
“The government decided to make us the poster couple for the PPE scandal, a convenient distraction to take the blame off them.”
She added that “many other suppliers who ran off with deposits or provided defective goods face no action”.
“Singling out one company in this way is not justice; it is scapegoating,” she said.
The government has been approached for comment.
