A judgement in the Department of Health’s £134 case against PPE Medpro is pending but the company has revealed it has already spent £4.3m defending itself and has just £666k left in assets
The protective gear company linked to Michelle Mone which is being sued by the government for about £134million has only £666,000 left in assets.
Accounts for PPE Medpro Ltd show it has spent £4.3m defending itself against the claim in the High Court. It increases the prospect that even if the government wins its claim over allegedly unusable PPE, little or no cash will be recouped for the taxpayer.
The firm was set up by a close associate of Baroness Mone and her businessman husband Doug Barrowman in the early weeks of the pandemic. It rapidly won more than £200m in Covid contracts for surgical gowns and facemasks through the government’s VIP procurement lane.
Baroness Mone initially denied any involvement in PPE Medpro to the Mirror but it later emerged she and her husband had benefitted from £65m in profits from the company. The pair, who deny any wrongdoing, are linked to over £100m in assets such as properties and a private jet.
Some have been frozen by the courts, others have been sold recently. The Department of Health launched proceedings in the High Court in 2022 over claims that 25 million gowns were unsuitable for use in the NHS after tests showed many were not sterile.
In court in July, PPE Medpro denied the claims, insisting the contamination must have happened in transit. The judgment in the case is pending.
The latest accounts for the company, for the 12 months to the end of July, show it had £541,000 worth of investments and was owed £1.2m. But after debts of £1.1m, the net assets were £666,025 – down from £2.1m a year previously.
PPE Medpro has declined to comment.
Its accounts refer to the Department of Health’s court claim for £133,577,920.20 plus interest, but state: “The company disputes the claim and served a defence and counterclaim… The company has used approximately £4.2million of reserves to defend the [department’s] claim.
“Since the balance sheet date further costs have been incurred in this respect which are… expected to be in the order of £100,000.”
Behind PPE Medpro was a consortium led by Mr Barrowman.
By June 2020, the company had been awarded two huge contracts after Baroness Mone, a Tory peer at the time, lobbied figures in the government.
When the Mirror first revealed links between her and the company in October 2020, her spokesman told us: “Baroness Mone has no comment as she has no role or involvement in PPE Medpro.”
In 2023, she said she rued misleading us, saying: “I regret not saying to the press straight away, ‘Yes, I am involved – and the government knew I was’.”
No issues have been raised with the facemasks the government paid nearly £81m for but gowns costing £122m were rejected in December 2020.
The National Crime Agency launched a fraud investigation into the deals, which has led to detectives interviewing Baroness Mone and her husband under caution.
Their homes in London and the Isle of Man were raided by officers in 2022.
The couple are suspected of offences including bribery and conspiracy to defraud. They deny all the allegations.
Baroness Mone, who founded underwear brand Ultimo, also faces a probe by the Lords Commissioner for Standards into whether she breached conduct rules by failing to register an interest in PPE Medpro and lobbying for it to get government contracts.
Around £75m of assets linked to Baroness Mone, 53, and her 60-year-old husband have been frozen or restrained by court order.
