MORE THAN 600,000 viewers tuned in to watch a new TV documentary about Lingerie tycoon Michelle Mone and her involvement in a PPE scandal.
Mone and her billionaire husband Doug Barrowman are being probed by the National Crime Agency over a £203million deal to supply NHS equipment during the pandemic.
She is alleged to have taken advantage of her House of Lords membership to use a “VIP fast lane” to recommend that PPE Medpro – led by Scots businessman Barrowman – supply the government.
For three years, the former Ultimo bra tycoon denied any involvement in the firm then admitted she lied to journalists in a TV interview.
Barrowman, 59, admitted making £65million from deals to supply face masks and sterile surgical gowns, with £29million transferred to a trust Mone 53, and her children benefited from.
Mone‘s career and rise to Tory peer was documented in Channel 5’s programme, The Michelle Mone Scandal: Where Did Our Money Go? last week.
We can reveal more than 629,000 viewers tuned in to watch the two part documentary which heard from former business associates and government officials who accused her of lying throughout her career.
It is claimed the Glasgowborn Peer abused her position to secure contracts in May and June 2020 with PPE Medpro while failing to declare an interest. The firm is being sued by the Government for £122million for breach of contract over claims surgical gowns were unfit for use.
The couple, who live on the Isle of Man, have had £75million of assets seized, including properties in Glasgow. They deny any wrongdoing.
Jo Maugham KC, who leads the Good Law Project campaign group, said: “Michelle Mone took advantage of her political connections to sell duff PPE at enormous profit.
“The truth is if you are a peer you get special access. She was emailing Michael Gove using their private email addresses.”
Nadine Dorries, health minister from 2020-2021 added: “God loves a trier but never trust a liar.
“At a time when nurses were cutting up black bin bags in order to protect themselves, she was coining it in.”
The documentary reflects on Mone’s dubious statements including that the bra worn by A-Lister Julia Roberts in film Erin Brockovich was her design and that Albert Einstein had once lived in her Glasgow home.
It also tells how Rod Stewart called her “a manipulative cow”.
PR consultant Jack Irvine, who worked with Mone in the 90s, said: “She had a habit of not telling me things I should know.
“Two things drive Michelle. Money and fame.”
A spokesman for the Mone and Barrowman said: “Faced with mounting public criticism of its COVID-19 response, and with individual ministers finding themselves personally implicated in arrangements with unsuitable suppliers, the previous government, via the Department for Health and Social Care, enlisted the resources and draconian criminal justice powers of the National Crime Agency, to mount a full-on legal attack against Baroness Mone and Mr Barrowman.”
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