Tory peer Baroness Michelle Mone – who is at the centre of controversy over her alleged links to a firm awarded £200m of PPE contracts – has lost the Conservative whip, Rishi Sunak has confirmed.
Yesterday, Baroness Mone said in a statement that she will take a break from the House of Lords to “clear her name” over the allegations.
Probing the PM on the matter at PMQs, Sir Keir Starmer asked: “How did his colleague Baroness Mone end up with nearly £30 million of taxpayers’ money in her bank account?”
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The prime minister said he was “absolutely shocked” to read allegations that Baroness Mone received millions originating from the profits of a government contract with PPE Medpro.
“It’s right that she is no longer attending the House of Lords and therefore no longer has the Conservative whip,” he told MPs in the House of Commons.
Losing the whip effectively means that an MP is expelled from their party and must sit as an independent until it is reinstated.
PPE Medpro was granted contracts to make surgical gowns and masks during the COVID pandemic after Baroness Mone flagged the firm to ministers through a so-called “VIP lane” system.
The VIP lane system saw a separate mailbox set up for MPs to send on offers from firms, but led to the government being criticised for giving preferential treatment to companies with political contacts.
Baroness Mone has since faced accusations of profiting from the business, but has consistently denied any “role or function” in the company, with lawyers previously saying she is “not connected to PPE Medpro in any capacity”.
Yesterday, a spokesman for Baroness Mone said: “With immediate effect, Baroness Mone will be taking a leave of absence from the House of Lords in order to clear her name of the allegations that have been unjustly levelled against her.”
The leave of absence means Baroness Mone will not attend sittings of the House, vote on any proceedings and will not be able to claim any allowance.
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A House of Lords spokesperson said: “Baroness Mone has written to the Clerk of the Parliaments to formally request to take leave of absence from the House of Lords.
“The Clerk has agreed to her request. Baroness Mone’s leave of absence is effective immediately.”
Responding to Ms Mone’s leave of absence, Labour’s deputy leader Angela Rayner said: “The Tories are all out of excuses.
“Ministers must now set out clear timelines on when, where, and how this information will be released. They can’t keep taking the public for fools by refusing to come clean on what they knew about this dodgy deal.
“Rishi Sunak was too weak to remove the whip, and has left it to Baroness Mone to finally read the writing on the wall.”
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Calling for the release of PPE contracts awarded to PPE Medpro, Ms Rayner accused members of the Tory party of using the pandemic as an “opportunity” to “get rich”.
She alleged that the company was awarded a £122m contract for gowns that “could not be used” and that £700,000 of “taxpayers’ money” a day is now being wasted on storing the unusable PPE.
The company has denied that the kit was faulty.
Chair of the Public Accounts Committee, Labour’s Meg Hillier, told Sky News it is “likely we probably won’t get a full look at them (the Baroness Mone correspondences) before Christmas”.
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Baroness Mone is currently under investigation by the House of Lords’ commissioner for standards, with parliament’s website saying the probe is over “alleged involvement in procuring contracts for PPE Medpro leading to potential breaches…of the House of Lords code of conduct”.
A spokesperson for the Department of Health and Social Care said: “Due diligence was carried out on all companies that were referred to the department and every company was subjected to the same checks.
“We acted swiftly to procure PPE at the height of the pandemic, competing in an overheated global market where demand massively outstripped supply.”
They added the department was “currently engaged in a mediation process with PPE Medpro”, so could not comment on the specifics of the contract.
