Good morning. Yesterday was already looking difficult for the Conservative peer Michelle Mone. In the morning, she announced that she will take a “leave of absence” from the House of Lords to address allegations about her involvement in PPE Medpro, a medical supply business that she appears to have lobbied ministers to use, and from the profits of which she appears to have received millions. Meanwhile, the government decided not to oppose a Labour motion seeking to force the release of documents relating to a £200m government contract awarded to the company.
But last night, new disclosures raised the pressure on Lady Mone again: a Guardian exclusive – which leads today’s paper – revealing that a second company she advocated for in an attempt to secure Covid contracts, LFI Diagnostics, was a secret entity of her husband Douglas Barrowman’s family office.
Mone and Barrowman did not respond to a detailed request for comment on LFI Diagnostics, but earlier, her spokesperson said that she was seeking a leave of absence “in order to clear her name of the allegations that have been unjustly levelled against her”.
There is no doubt that the story is complicated. But at its heart is a simple question: was public money spent responsibly on emergency PPE at the height of the pandemic – or subject to undue influence by the government’s political allies? Today’s newsletter, drawing on two years of dogged reporting by the Guardian’s David Conn and his colleagues, is a simple guide to a saga that is threatening to become a major scandal. Here are the headlines.
Five big stories
US politics | The Democratic incumbent, Raphael Warnock, has won the Georgia Senate runoff, delivering an important 51st seat to bolster his party’s majority in the chamber. Joe Biden described Warnock’s victory over the Donald Trump-endorsed Herschel Walker as a defeat for Republican extremism.
Cop15 | The UN’s environment chief has warned that “we are at war with nature” and must “make peace”, as countries gather at Cop15 in Montreal to agree a deal to protect biodiversity. Draft targets include proposals to protect 30% of land and sea, repurpose billions in harmful subsidies and tackle invasive species.
Conservatives | Rishi Sunak has signalled the end of a moratorium on new onshore wind projects in an attempt to head off a row with Tory MPs, his second U-turn in two days. The climbdown comes after pressure from backbenchers including Boris Johnson and Liz Truss.
Strep A | Primary schoolchildren at risk from a severe form of strep A could be given preventive antibiotics as a blanket measure, in a move described as “rare” by health officials. At least nine children have died due to complications from strep A bacterial infections since September, but most infections are mild.
China | China’s national health authority said on Wednesday that asymptomatic Covid-19 cases and those with mild symptoms can self-treat while in quarantine at home, the strongest sign so far that China is preparing its people to live with the disease.
In depth: Who is Michelle Mone?
When Michelle Mone was granted a peerage seven years ago, and appointed as David Cameron’s “entrepreneurship tsar” to lead a review of obstacles to business success for people from deprived backgrounds, it appeared to be the climax of an extraordinary triumph over adversity.
Mone, who left school at 15 with no qualifications, had gone on to found the lingerie brand Ultimo. She eventually sold 80% of her stake in the company, which later went out of business. While some were sceptical of her credentials as a business role model, the Conservatives were delighted to have her. Iain Duncan Smith, then the work and pensions secretary, said: “I want Michelle to report back to me on how we can encourage people of all backgrounds to take up this entrepreneurial spirit.”
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What is PPE Medpro?
When the pandemic began, PPE Medpro didn’t exist – but then an opportunity arose. In March 2020, facing severe shortages of crucial personal protective equipment for the NHS, the government decided to take emergency action: it dispensed with the usual competitive procurement process, designed to maximise value for money for the taxpayer, and instead allowed the awarding of contracts without competition at prices which a cabinet office memo disclosed in court (PDF) acknowledged “may be higher than would be expected in a regular market”.
It also set up a “high-priority lane”, now often referred to as a “VIP lane”, to allow MPs, ministers and senior officials to refer would-be suppliers. Six weeks later, PPE Medpro was incorporated in the UK. One of its directors, Anthony Page, said that there was a “group behind PPE Medpro” with decades of experience in distributing medical products. But he declined to name them due to “confidentiality obligations”.
Within weeks, PPE Medpro had contracts worth £203m to supply millions of masks and gowns for use in the NHS. It bought 25m sterile gowns from a Chinese manufacturer for £46m, and sold them on to the government for £122m. That meant PPE Medpro shared with three intermediary firms profits on that deal of up to £76m, minus shipping and logistics costs. No other companies bid for the contracts.
Despite that significant expense, something went wrong: the gowns were rejected by the Department of Health and Social Care after a technical inspection. For the last 10 months, the DHSC has been trying to get its money back. PPE Medpro insists the gowns passed inspection and it is entitled to keep the money.
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How is Mone linked to PPE Medpro?
David Conn has been reporting on the story for the last two years – you can hear an excellent episode of Today In Focus on his investigation here.
His first story about PPE Medpro was published on 21 December 2020. In that story, he reported that two of the company’s directors, including Page, were linked to a tax advisory and wealth management firm in the Isle of Man run by Mone’s husband, Douglas Barrowman – and that Page had previously been the registered secretary for Mone’s personal brand company.
But a lawyer for Barrowman and Mone claimed then that neither was an investor, director or shareholder in the company, and said in a statement: “Baroness Mone has never had any role or function in PPE Medpro, nor in the process by which contracts were awarded to PPE Medpro.” She has never declared the company on the Lords register of interests.
In the time since, that story appears to have changed. This 23 November piece by Conn sets out the complicated history of statements on Mone and Barrowman’s behalf, and the established facts.
While Mone’s lawyer said that “she did not benefit financially”, documents revealed by the Guardian last month indicate that Barrowman was paid at least £65m in profits, of which a trust benefiting Mone and her children secretly received £29m in October 2020. A lawyer for Mone said that she was “under no duty” to comment and could not do so for “a number of reasons”. A lawyer for Barrowman and PPE Medpro said that “there is much inaccuracy in the portrayal of the alleged ‘facts’ and a number of them are completely wrong”.
Then there’s the question of what role Mone played in securing the contracts. After that initial claim that she played no part in the procurement process, a freedom of information request revealed that she had referred the company to government contacts via the VIP lane.
Mone’s lawyer then said she had taken “the very simple, solitary and brief step of referring PPE Medpro as a potential supplier to the office of Lord Agnew”, then a cabinet office minister.
But leaked emails suggest that she later lobbied Lord Bethell, a DHSC minister, to promote PPE Medpro’s Covid tests. The Sunday Times reported (£) that Mone tried to “bully and hector” Michael Gove and Lord Agnew to the extent that Gove reportedly called her “a right pain in the arse”. And in a serialisation of his diaries this week, former health secretary Matt Hancock said that she sent him an “extraordinarily aggressive email complaining that a company she’s helping isn’t getting the multimillion-pound contracts it deserves”. So far, Mone’s lawyers have not commented on that claim.
In the new story reporting that a second company which Mone advocated for, LFI Diagnostics, was a secret entity of her husband’s family office, it is revealed that her lobbying prompted a letter from Bethell reminding her of “the need for propriety”. Mone and Barrowman did not respond to a request for comment on LFI Diagnostics.
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What happens now?
Mone continues to say that the allegations against her are unfounded, and she intends to clear her name. If she does take a leave of absence from the House of Lords, it would mean that she is no longer bound by parliamentary rules to declare her interests.
The House of Lords commissioner for standards is already investigating her over “potential breaches” of the Lords’ code of conduct. The commissioner could block her request for if he concludes she is trying to avoid that investigation – which cannot be finalised or published before the completion of a National Crime Agency probe into potential fraud at PPE Medpro which involved a raid on the mansion where Mone lives with Barrowman.
Meanwhile, although the Conservative party has not removed the whip from Mone, it decided yesterday not to oppose a Labour motion that would force the release of documents relating to the PPE Medpro contracts – a move that protected its MPs from a potentially embarrassing vote. While in theory that means the paperwork will be released, health minister Will Quince indicated that it was likely to be delayed and redacted.
Mone, for her part, has largely communicated through her lawyer – but last month, she may have made an elliptical reference to the story on social media. She posted an illustration on Instagram of a boy sitting on a pile of books, staring at the moon, next to the words: “Don’t believe everything you read, or everything you think.”
What else we’ve been reading
As reports of Strep A swirl around, it can be difficult to discern what’s true and what’s not. Devi Sridhar helpfully breaks down why this common infection is spreading and in some cases causing deaths in children. Nimo
As the global biodiversity summit, Cop15, begins, this visual guide is a superb explainer of what’s at stake. One stark fact: “wildlife populations have plunged by an average of 69% between 1970 and 2018”. Archie
Christopher Cherry and Maeve Shearlaw’s documentary on the cost of living crisis in North Tyneside is brilliant. They meet the women transforming a building in disrepair into a women-focused support centre to provide women in the local area with whatever it is they may need. Nimo
Jim Waterson’s piece on coverage of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s forthcoming Netflix series is a helpful examination of a row already under way. He argues that “newspapers are turning a documentary about how the media treated the couple into a story about how the couple are treating the media”. Archie
The music industry has always been at the whim of the technology that is en vogue. This New Yorker (£) piece explains how TikTok has been the latest vehicle for transformation in the industry – but is it a good thing? Nimo
World Cup
U2 puns abounded when Morocco’s goalkeeper Bono saved three penalties in a shootout against Spain to secure a place in the quarter-finals after a 0-0 draw. The result is the tournament’s most consequential shock yet, and Ben Fisher wrote that even Morocco’s manager Walid Regragui “kept tapping his head with both hands while on the run to join the party, as if to say: is this really happening?”
The other last 16 match between Portugal and Switzerland was a more one-sided affair, but a 6-1 victory for Portugal overshadowed the fact that Cristiano Ronaldo was dropped. His replacement, 21-year-old Gonçalo Ramos, scored a hat-trick. Jonathan Liew wrote that Ramos left the stadium “with his life changed forever: a hat-trick and an assist, accomplished with the irrepressible confidence of a young man convinced the stage is his to own”.
Meanwhile, you can sate your need for more build-up to England v France on Saturday with Jacob Steinberg’s account of how Gareth Southgate began his preparation for the game with a briefing on his opponents that has been in the works for the last two years. And here’s Tom Phillips in Boa Vista on how Brazil’s football fans have taken against Roy Keane after he criticised their team for dancing to celebrate their goals in Monday’s 4-1 victory over South Korea. “Roy Keane be damned,” wrote the sports columnist Julio Gomes.
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The front pages
“Mone lobbied for second firm with secret links to husband” – if you’ve read down this far, our Guardian splash headline should need no explanation. “Baroness Bra PPE bust-up” – that’s the strap line in the Metro, where the main headline is “Mone alone”. Its intro says the on-leave peer has been “abandoned” by the Tory party. The Financial Times leads with “Sunak pressed to speed up anti-strike legislation as industrial action surges” while the Daily Express says “Ambulance strike to put ‘lives at risk’” and the Telegraph has “Ambulance unlikely if you fall, elderly told”. The Daily Mail fumes: “Labour in hock to unions crippling Britain” and the Times says “Paramedics urged not to risk lives with strike”. The i reports “UK’s Strep A fightback may need extra antibiotics” while the Mirror has a devastating story, “Strep A took away my princess”, about the death of Stella-Lily McCorkindale, 5, from Belfast. “Eet eez coming ’ome” – some strange work in the Sun which took a waxwork of France footballer Kylian Mbappé, dressed it up as a Three Lions fan and turned it into a front page.
Today in Focus
What’s gone wrong with England’s water?
More untreated sewage is being pumped into England’s seas and rivers than ever before. Sandra Laville follows the money to find out who is responsible
Cartoon of the day | Martin Rowson
The Upside
A bit of good news to remind you that the world’s not all bad
Amateur fossil hunters from outback Queensland have found the remains of a 100m-year-old being that palaeontologists are comparing to the Rosetta Stone because of its potential open up the discovery of new species of prehistoric marine giant.
The discovery is significant because it would be the first time that an elasmosaur skull had been found connected to its body in Australia, meaning that now palaeontologists could decipher other fossils that are being held in museums. The Rock Chicks – the group that made the discovery – have given researchers the chance to answer questions that for a long time have completely eluded them.
Sign up here for a weekly roundup of The Upside, sent to you every Sunday
Bored at work?
And finally, the Guardian’s crosswords to keep you entertained throughout the day – with plenty more on the Guardian’s Puzzles app for iOS and Android. Until tomorrow.
• This story was amended on 7 December 2022 to correct Douglas Barrowman’s name.
