UK government urged to strip Michelle Mone of peerage

Mone was made a life peer in 2015 by then Prime Minister David Cameron

Baroness Michelle Mone should be stripped of her peerage for her role in a Covid contract scandal, the SNP have said.

A company linked to the Glaswegian entrepreneur has been ordered by the High Court to repay £122m to the UK government for breaching an NHS contract.

SNP Westminster leader Stephen Flynn called on Labour ministers to remove her title through an act of parliament.

Chancellor Rachel Reeves said she hoped Mone, who is on a leave of absence from the Lords, "won't be back" in the upper chamber.

Asked if she supported call for Mone to be stripped of her peerage, Reeves told BBC Radio 5 Live: "I'm not sure if that's within my powers".

But the chancellor added: "Clearly she shouldn't be making laws."

PPE Medpro, which was set up by a consortium led by Mone's husband, Doug Barrowman, was awarded lucrative deals to supply 25 million medical gowns during the pandemic.

A spokesman for Mr Barrowman, who is also from Glasgow, described the judgement a "whitewash", while Mone said it required a "quantum leap of faith".

The protective equipment PPE Medpro was contracted to supply has been in storage since 2020 after the company failed to prove it was correctly sterilised.

Mone - who recommended the company to the government through the "VIP lane" - initially denied being linked to the firm, but admitted to the BBC in 2023 that she had lied about not being involved.

While a life peerage cannot be relinquished, Mone could choose to resign from being a member of the House of Lords.

Her peerage can only be removed through an act of parliament.

Flynn told BBC Scotland News: "This can't be the end of the story. That money needs to be back in the public purse but most importantly there needs to be consequences.

"Michelle Mone should not be in the House of Lords. The government can make sure that doesn't happen and I will support them if they do that."

He added: "Is it ok that Michelle Mone continues to sit in the House of Lords, is it ok that she continues to make laws over all of our lives?

"I think the overwhelming view from the Scottish public will be no."

Michelle Mone and Doug Barrowman have criticised the court's ruling

Baroness Mone of Mayfair was given her title by then prime minister David Cameron in 2015. He also appointed Mone as his government's "entrepreneurship tsar".

The baroness was stripped of the Conservative whip following revelations about PPE Medpro and is on leave from the House of Lords.

Scottish Green MSP Patrick Harvie called for Mone to step down from the House of Lords, which he said should be abolished.

He said: "Even by the standards of the Lords, this saga has been totally shameful.

"It's clear that Michelle Mone should resign, but the problem isn't just her individual choices, it is the system that put her in such a powerful and unaccountable position in the first place."

Scottish Labour deputy leader Jackie Baillie said that PPE Medpro must pay back the full sum owed.

She added: "At a time of national emergency, they chose to pursue their own self-interest by lining their pockets with taxpayers' money."

A Scottish Conservative spokesperson said: "The Conservative Party removed the whip from Michelle Mone when these allegations came to light."

'Full force of the law'

A High Court judge ordered that PPE Medpro - which has gone into administration - must pay back the £122m plus intertest to the UK Department of Health and Social Care by 15 October.

Reeves said it was "disappointing" that the firm had gone into administration but said she would would "do everything" in her power to recover money that "belongs in our schools, in our hospitals and in our communities".

Mone described the court ruling as "nothing less than an establishment win for the government in a case that was too big to lose".

A spokesman for Mr Barrowman said: "This judgment is a white wash of the facts and shows that justice was being seen to be done, where the outcome was always certain for the DHSC and the government."

Legislation to remove peerages has not been introduced since 1917, when it was used to strip titles from "enemies" of the UK during World War One.

More recent legislation has created provisions for cancelling or suspending a person's membership of the House of Lords, but only in certain circumstances such as when they have been convicted of a serious criminal offence.

A separate National Crime Agency (NCA) investigation into Medpro has been ongoing since May 2021.

It is looking into suspected criminal offences committed over the procurement of PPE.